Eskimo Joe

Eskimo Joe are an Australian alternative rock band that was formed in 1997 by Stuart MacLeod, on lead guitar, Joel Quartermain, on drums and guitar, and Kavyen Temperley, on bass guitar and vocals, in East Fremantle, Western Australia, Australia. The band has released five additional albums since their debut album Girl was released in 2001: A Song Is a City, released in 2004; Black Fingernails, Red Wine, released in 2006; Inshalla, released in May 2009; Ghosts of the Past, released on 12 August 2011; and Wastelands, released on 20 September 2013. Eskimo Joe have won eight ARIA Music Awards; in 2006, the band achieved four wins—from nine nominations—for work associated with Black Fingernails, Red Wine. Eskimo Joe founders MacLeod and Temperley were school mates at John Curtin Senior High School. Temperley left school at sixteen to concentrate on writing music, moving into a share house with Simon Leach, who played bass guitar in a funk band called Carpet. The other members were his brother Stuart on drums and guitarist Joel Quartermain—all three were former students at Hollywood Senior High School. When Temperley joined Carpet they changed the name to Freud's Pillow. The band performed around Perth and Fremantle from 1995 to 1998, and released an EP Pleasure Puppy in 1997; MacLeod, although not a member, is credited with co-writing "Mr Hoek" on the EP. Despite their modest popularity, Quartermain and Temperley were unhappy with the band's musical style. While recording the EP, Temperley started jamming for a side project with MacLeod, writing several short and simple pop–punk songs. They auditioned a number of drummers and eventually settled on Quartermain, who they believed was more musical. Formed as an alternative rock group in 1997 in East Fremantle, Eskimo Joe was initially a side project of Freud's Pillow, with MacLeod on guitar, Quartermain on drums and guitar, and Temperley on bass guitar and vocals. Eskimo Joe's first gig was in August 1997 at the University of Western Australia, in a local heat for the National Campus Band Competition—they proceeded to the state final in Perth and then the national final in Sydney. For winning the national final, they were awarded a place at the 1997 Livid Festival in Brisbane and a studio recording session in Sydney. Freud's Pillow officially split within a few months of Eskimo Joes' win. Simon Leach eventually formed Little Birdy in 2002, while Stuart played drums for One Horse Town and later for The Bank Holidays. In April 1998, Eskimo Joe recorded their debut release the Sweater EP. Its title track, "Sweater", received significant airplay on national Australian radio station Triple J and reached No. 33 on the station's Hottest 100 of 1998. After touring for numerous months, Eskimo Joe returned to the studio and, in 1999, issued a second EP, the self-titled Eskimo Joe. Two tracks, "Ruby Wednesday" and "Turn Up Your Stereo", were voted into the Triple J Hottest 100 of that year. The band were voted into the No. 2 position on the 'Brightest Hope' list by the readers of Rolling Stone (Australia). Eskimo Joe signed with Universal Records' alternative offshoot Modular, in 1999. They recorded their debut album, Girl, with producer Ed Buller (Ben Lee, Pulp, Suede). It reached No. 29 on the ARIA Albums Chart and was certified gold. Tracks such as "Who Sold Her Out" and "Planet Earth" received airplay on Triple J, with the former reaching the top 100 on the ARIA Singles Chart and the latter listed at No. 31 on Triple J's Hottest 100 of 2001. Some tracks featured on TV series, The Secret Life of Us. Rock music journalist, Ed Nimmervoll, compared the album to their earlier work, "The nonsensical songs about stereos, alcohol and farting were replaced by Beatlesque highly relatable songs about the ups and downs about the day-to-day life". The band's live shows began to incorporate keyboards and an extra guitar. At the ARIA Music Awards of 2001, the band's single, "Wake Up", with a promotional clip by Ben Saunders, won the 'Best Video' category. Despite Girl being a top 30 album and earning a gold record, Modular ended the band's contract. Eskimo Joe signed with Festival Mushroom Records in 2002. They recorded their second album, A Song Is a City, produced by Paul McKercher and mixed by Nick Launay, in 2003. Released in May 2004, it peaked at No. 2 and, by 2006, achieved double platinum status. For live shows, Quartermain switched to guitar and Paul Keenan – also from Fremantle – played drums, and Dan Bull played keyboards. At the time of the album's release, Temperley explained: The whole album is really about me, my friends, the people I love and Fremantle. It's the stories that go on between us. It's similar to the people in every place all over the world. For me, that's what I'm writing about. I'm definitely not writing about New York. I'm writing about Fremantle. The lead single "From the Sea" reached the top 40 in March 2004, and was number-one on the Triple J Net 50. It was used as the backing track for a series of TV ads for the West Coast Eagles Football Club. "Smoke" was released as the second single and was listed in the top 5 on Triple J's Net 50 in May. The third single, "Older Than You", became their second top 50 ARIA Singles Chart hit after they performed it at the ARIA Music Awards of 2004 in October. At the ceremony, A Song Is a City won two awards for 'Producer of the Year' and 'Engineer of the Year' for both McKercher and Eskimo Joe. In August 2005, the Eskimo Joe DVD was released with all the film clips for tracks from the Eskimo Joe EP and the first two albums, a feature-length documentary, a collection of live performances, and some rare tracks, including "Sweater". They won 'Best Group' at the ARIA Music Awards of 2005 for "Older Than You". MacLeod arranged for the band to produce their third album, Black Fingernails, Red Wine, themselves, which "shifted the emphasis from the songs and their performance to an over-all sound". Its title track, "Black Fingernails, Red Wine", released in May 2006, which peaked at No. 6, became their first Top 10 single. The song also reached No. 1 on ARIA's digital track chart. The album followed in June and debuted at No. 1 on the ARIA Albums Chart. It spent 51 weeks in the Top 50 and achieved four times platinum status. Its second single, "Sarah", was issued in September and peaked at No. 12. The B-sides are live and acoustic versions of "Black Fingernails, Red Wine" and a cover of the Pixies' "Hey" recorded for Triple J's Like a Version collection. The third single "New York" was released early in 2007 and reached No. 26. The fourth single, "Breaking Up", in which the music video starred actress Teresa Palmer, attained the top 100. In August, "Black Fingernails, Red Wine", was issued as the band's debut United States single. The fifth Australian single, "London Bombs", was released in October as a digital only single. The song was awarded first place in the 'Performance Category' at the 2007 International Songwriting Competition. At the ARIA Music Awards of 2006, Eskimo Joe were nominated for nine awards and won four. Black Fingernails, Red Wine won 'Producer of the Year' for Eskimo Joe and 'Engineer of the Year' for Matt Lovell, "Black Fingernails, Red Wine" won 'Single of the Year' and Eskimo Joe won Best Music DVD. Their fourth studio album, Inshalla, was released in May 2009. The group had played tracks at gigs prior to its release, including the title track, "Inshalla". The term, insha'Allah is Arabic for 'God willing' which Temperley had heard during a visit to Egypt. According to Nimmervoll, "The album was put together in the same spirit, instead of the extremelely [sic] focused record they had wanted with Black Fingernails, Red Wine with Inshalla Eskimo Joe let the songs and the music take them wherever they led". The lead single, "Foreign Land", was issued in April and peaked at No. 13. Inshalla became the band's second album to debut at No. 1, and