Pitchfork: Drones Win Australian Music Prize, Issue Single

Drones Win Australian Music Prize, Issue Single

The Australian Music Prize-- the Down Under equivalent of the Mercury Music Prize or our own New Pantheon Music Award-- is famed for making some of the best Australian bands $25,000 richer and immeasurably more popular.

Last month, howlin' drunk-rockers the Drones beat out Architecture in Helsinki, Ben Lee, Dirty Three, the Go-Betweens, the Veronicas, Wolfmother, and countless Aussie bands we've never heard of to take home the 2005 AMP for their album Wait Long by the River and the Bodies of Your Enemies Will Float By. Congrats, mates!

To celebrate their victory, the four-piece will release the double-A-side single "Shark Fin Blues"/"You Really Don't Care" tomorrow, March 18, in the UK on ATP Recordings, and May 2 in the U.S. courtesy of Forced Exposure. Both songs are from Wait Long by the River. The Drones' new album, tentatively titled Gala Mill, is set for delivery in September on ATP.

The Drones are currently wrapping up an Australian tour, and will head to England in May for the Mudhoney-curated day of the All Tomorrow's Parties festival.

Dates:

04-22 Melbourne, Australia - The Corner
04-29 Hobart, Australia - The Republic Bar
05-12 East Sussex, England - Camber Sands Holiday Centre (All Tomorrow's Parties) *

* with Mudhoney, Comets on Fire, Black Mountain, the Scientists, Country Teasers, David Dondero, Jon Wahl & the Amadans, Total Sound Troup Direction Action Committee, the Flesh Eaters, Mark Pickerel, Holly Golightly

* Pitchfork Review: The Drones: Wait Long by the River and the Bodies of Your Enemies Will Float By