Convenience Store

Convenience Store’s latest release, ‘When Soft Voices Die’, is a 29-minute concert film
and live EP. The work features a live recording of their show at the Evelyn Hotel in
2023, featuring seven musicians creating an intimate indie-folk sound with ambient and
krautrock influences. Notes of Americana in their live set invoke the live sound of Big
Thief or Alex G.
The work is inspired by the idea of collapsing the distinction between live performance
and recorded work. The stage design of the live show resembles a mock recording
studio, which foreshadows the music’s ultimate fate as a distributed recording via the
release of this project. The music ‘returns’ as a live EP, reframing the live show as an
inventive DIY recording space.
The film is to be premiered at Cinema Nova on January 12, at a free event by RSVP.
Convenience Store is the Naarm/Melbourne music project of songwriter-producer duo
Nick Baker and Jack Phillips. Their recordings are a DIY waterfall of intimate lo-fi play,
earnest indie rock sensibilities, and euphoric memories of UK guitar bands. Over the
course of 2022-2023, a string of over a dozen single releases has seen the act explore
an eclectic sound that draws comparisons to the dynamic recording style and unique
songwriting of acts like Alex G, Animal Collective, and Big Thief.
Their work has had rotation locally and abroad on KEXP (USA), NTS (UK), RRR,
Double J, and Triple J. In 2023 their debut national tour, titled ‘tour of australia’, saw
Convenience Store perform in 4-piece band form at ten venues across their home
country, including dates at Oxford Art Factory in Sydney and an in-store Jet Black Cat
Music show in Brisbane. Their most recent release, ‘Music From Drehmomente’, was a
kaleidoscopic detour into ambient film scoring for the Berlin independent film
‘Drehmomente’ (‘Turning Points’). The pair visited RRR to debut the work on RRR’s
Local and/or General show.

Convenience Store’s output extends into the world of their expressive self-directed
music videos, where their DIY spirit is redoubled with filmic visual work that adds
another dimension to their music. Borrowing from the styles of classic cinema, video
art, and digital culture, their music videos have received consistent rotation on Rage,
winning multiple ‘Wild One’ features. Their YouTube channel has attracted over 35,000
views.
Performances such as their packed-out show at the Evelyn Hotel in Melbourne
showcase a unique and sincere live set haunted by the detritus of guitar-rock
convention.