OVER $42,000 RAISED AT PARKLIFE 2012!

We can’t begin to thank Fuzzy enough for the incredible amount raised for Heaps Decent at Parklife this year. At each of their events, Fuzzy allow us to collect a $20 donation from all complimentary ticket holders as they enter the festival. These donations have allowed us to keep putting on our workshops each week, […]

Photos: Heaps Decent at Adelaide Parklife

Here are a few photos of our Heaps Decent volunteers working hard at Parklife in Adelaide earlier this month – stay tuned for more pics from Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth. Thanks to everyone that helped out on the day, we hope you had a great time and we couldn’t have done it without you!

Chairlift

Parklife favourites Chairlift made a very special appearance at our Juniperina workshops in 2012!

VIDEO: JUNIPERINA SEPTEMBER 2012

A recap from our facilitators about their trip to Juniperina earlier this month!

VIDEO: HEAPS DECENT x CHANNEL [V]

Check out the action from Channel [V] presenter Billy Russell’s recording session at ‘Home Base’…

DEADLY DAYS FESTIVAL

Kristy Lee and Joyride are at the “Deadly Days” festival in Wauchope and Ballina this week!

VIDEO: THE WINGS DROP IN CENTRE RAP

Meet Tony Gilfoyle and Candela Alvarez, who for the last 5 years have been running the WINGS Drop In Centre in Wilcannia.

VIDEO: ‘My World’ by Tasha Lee Marshall + 2 new tracks!

Check out Tasha, she’s pretty awesome!!

CHANNEL V FILM AT HOME BASE

Channel V came down to Home Base yesterday to make a song with the Heaps Decent crew!

THANKS TO MINISTRY OF SOUND!

A HUGE THANKS to Ministry Of Sound, who donated a whole stack of CDs to our workshop participants.

Campbelltown workshops

A little while back, Kristy Lee, Shantan and Pablo Calamari finished a series of workshops in Campbelltown at both Lomandra school and the Reiby Juvenile Justice Centre. In an unconventional format, here’s a bit about their experience….

Parklife 2012 workshops

With Parklife just around the corner we reflect on some of the amazing guest artists that we’ve been lucky enough to work with lately. Special mention to Fuzzy for the hook-ups!

Stay tuned for who we’ll be working with this Parklife….

EVENT: ARCADE ASSEMBLY – AUGUST 22-26

Be part of a giant interactive board game at Shopfront’s Arcade Assembly this month!

VIDEO: HOME BASE ALL-STARS SHOWCASE

Find out what went on at our Home Base Showcase at Fraser Studios in May!

VIDEO: ‘DINNERTIME’ by St. Therese Community School, Wilcannia

The debut video from our first Wilcannia workshop is here! The amazingly talented Sydney illustrator Georgia Perry, along with the fine people at Toby and Pete, have crafted this brilliant animation for “Dinnertime”.

Parklife Volunteers Needed

Heaps Decent are looking for volunteers to help us out at Parklife Festivals all across Australia!

VIDEO: ‘Domestic Violence’ by Big H

Check out the new clip for Big H’s “Domestic Violence”!

ONE YEAR OF WAGGA WAGGA SATELLITE SESSIONS

Heaps Decent has a long history with the Riverina, the region of south-west NSW that includes Wagga Wagga. Since the first ever Heaps Decent workshops at Riverina Juvenile Justice Centre in 2007, we have returned regularly, meeting new people to include in our workshops with each new visit. Over the last 12 months we were […]

DJ CRAZE & CODES AT HOME BASE

On Monday we had a special visit from international DJ/Producers DJ Craze & Codes…

Home Base All-Stars Showcase, Fraser Studios

We threw an encore warehouse jam on 20th May for the Home Base All-Stars Showcase!

Rhanni From Key College

Kristy and Rowan take some time out from producing hits at Key College to chat with Rhanni about what she’s been up to lately…

HEAPS DECENT SHOWCASE AT FRASER STUDIOS

Come down to Fraser Studios on Sunday to catch a warehouse party with the Home Base All Stars performing live!

VIDEO: HEAPS DECENT IN WILCANNIA

In March, we made the trip out to Wilcannia for the first week of our two year workshop project. Check out Kristy’s incredible video for an insight into our amazing few days…

A belated thanks to Alison / welcome first Heaps Decent baby!!

And now for something personal! For more than 6 months, the incredible Alison Wilkes interned with Charlie and Erin at Heaps Decent HQ. Part of the yearly intern program at our benefactor, Fuzzy, Alison assisted us through our Parklife volunteer drive and workshops, was an integral part of our website renewal and generally an amazing energy […]

ALL STARS: HOME BASE SHOWCASE

A little over two weeks ago, the back room of Sydney’s Goodgod Small Club was heaving with onstage energy via our Home Base All Stars.

BIG PICTURE

Are you interested in photography and digital storytelling?

Want to hangout with professional photographers and get access to hi-tec digital labs?

Flashpoint Labs is running a changemaking photography and digital storytelling program for young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in the Easter Holidays

Petersham project

Kristy Lee’s account of her first few weeks of workshops this term. Make sure you listen to some of the tracks in her post!

HEAPS DECENT SHOWCASE – THIS FRIDAY 30TH MARCH!

If you’re in Sydney this Friday, we’re holding a Home Base Showcase to give the guys that we work with each week an opportunity to perform their songs – come and check out the fantastic work we’ve been doing! The Showcase goes down from 7pm to 9pm this Friday night at Goodgod Small Club and some of the guys will be performing their songs live!

THANKS HEAPS!

Heaps Decent raised just over a whopping $18,000 thanks to all the wonderful people who donated at Fuzzy’s Shore Thing and Field Day events over the New Year period and to Fuzzy for allowing us to collect donations from their guests!

12th Planet, Jack Beats, Devlin & Ghostdad at Home Base

We were recently lucky enough to score some more amazing guest artists from Fuzzy’s touring roster, who came down to work with us at Home Base.

MAELSTROM AT HOME BASE

Late in 2011, French producer Maelstrom graced us with his presence at our  Home Base workshop in Redfern. After hearing about Heaps Decent from friend and fellow Frenchie Teki Latex, Mael contacted us about coming to a workshop during the Sydney leg of his recent Australian tour so we took him up on his generous […]

Rapping at Parliament House

Two weeks ago, Heaps Decent was lucky enough to be invited by the Department of Human Services to have some young people we work with perform at Parliament House in Canberra. MC Kurva and Fowl Murk put on a stunning performance, making history in the process as the first ever people to rap in Parliament House!

Key College Presentation Day

Yesterday Heaps Decent turned out in force to support the young people we work with at Key College at their 2011 presentation day. We want to extend a huge congratulations to all the Key College graduates and want to thank them for the amazing music that Heaps Decent facilitators Nina Las Vegas and Joyride have been producing with them all year. We are super proud of them all!

Wagga Sessions – October

Heaps Decent’s October Wagga Sessions saw facilitators Adam Bozzetto and Joyride reach more areas of Wagga Wagga, unearth more budding young rappers and record more tracks than ever before.

HEAPS DECENT HURSTVILLE WORKSHOPS

Heaps Decent facilitators Kristy Lee and Joyride recently facilitated some workshops with the Hurstville Council. Check out the great music they made with the young people there!

Home Base Update

Check out some of the latest Home Base recordings – we have some seriously talented young people coming down to lay down some lyrics and work on their tracks.

Riverina Boys EP

Wax Motif produced hit “Burnt Warrior”!

Check out the awesome EP we’ve just released with tracks from some of the young people are Riverina Juvenile Justice Centre in Wagga Wagga, produced by Heaps Decent superstar facilitator Adam Bozzetto with special guests Wax Motif and Joyride.

Shore Thing and Field Day Volunteers!

The end of the year is hot on our heels, which means huge New Years celebrations Shore Thing and Field Day will soon be upon us. This is a callout for volunteers to help out Heaps Decent at these festivals.

Icey: Live at Parklife

A big congratulations to Icey, Kurva, Tweak and Teks from our Home Base workshops at Redfern Community Centre. Heaps Decent were given the opportunity to program the opening slot on one of the stages at Parklife festival in Sydney this year and the boys from Home Base performed an absolutely killer set. Check out their performance live on tape here!

Thank You

A massive THANK YOU to all the amazing volunteers and supporters who helped us out at Parklife festivals right across Australia.

A-Trak is Heaps Decent

Last week, A-Trak, one half of Duck Sauce, took some time out from his busy Parklife tour schedule to hang out at Home Base, Heaps Decent’s weekly drop-in workshop at Redfern Community Centre.

Lykke Li is Heaps Decent

Last week in the midst of Parklife madness Charlie Chux, Adam Bozetto, Alison Wilkes and I were joined by none other than Lykke Li and her backing singer Zhala, as we headed to Juniperina Juvenile Justice Centre for HEAPS DECENT.

Key College Update

Nina and Rowan have been continuing their weekly workshops at Key College, a Redfern based college run by Youth Off The Streets, with great success!

PARKLIFE VOLUNTEERS

A callout for volunteers at the Parklife festivals, Australia wide. WE NEED HELP, please spread the word!

Time to Get Deadly!

Check out the exciting final products from the Heaps Decent and Shopfront workshops we’ve been running with Miimali at Mount Druitt High School for the last six weeks.

We’re Going to Lomandra!

Heaps Decent’s Kristy and Merlo have been facilitating weekly workshops at Lomandra School as part of Shopfront’s Machine Atlas Project.

Machine atlas

A new Shopfront work premiering at Kogarah Town Square from 25-28 August. Make sure you get in and register your attendance as it’s limited capacity!

Snickers Sessions

Snickers Sessions is proof that even Miami Horror and Phrase aren’t themselves when they’re hungry. To raise money for Heaps Decent, they’ve agreed to cover a song completely out of their genres. And the best bit is you get to help choose what track they cover! Vote for your favourite from 11th – 22nd July and Snickers will donate $1 for each vote until we reach $20K!

Home Base

Our drop-in project Home Base has been running for almost 4 months now! Being set up at the Redfern Community Centre affords us a great facility and location for anyone to drop by and make music with us. We started off with 3 attendees and now have a regular attendance of 10 or more. The young peoples’ ages range from 14 to 20 years old and they are from all parts of Sydney.

Jeremy and Tom

Coming into the workshops with little musical experience, Tom quickly flourished in the world of Ableton with guidance from myself (at Home Base) and from Adam Maggs of LiveSchool (outside of Home Base). Boz and Charlie got the ball rolling with a chord progression that resembled that of the one featured in ‘Barbra Streisand’.

‘Tuned In’ at Oxford Art Factory

Huge THANKS to the Hobo Gestapo guys for coming down to shoot last week’s Tuned In event, run by NSW Reconciliation Council at Oxford Art Factory.

Heaps Decent at Liveschool

Over the past month or so, Heaps Decent has put all of our facilitators through a training course at the only Ableton certified training centre in Australia, Liveschool.

Mumdance at Homebase

Recenlty at Home Base, our weekly studio session/workshop at Redfern Community Centre, Heaps Decent were lucky enough to have the amazing talents of UK producer and nice guy Jack Adams aka Mumdance along to help us out.

Hugo & Vine for Sorry Day

Next Thursday is Sorry Day and Redfern Community Centre are hosting their Hugo & Vine event, drawing together some of Redfern’s diverse pool of music talent – professionals, students and keen amateurs – to share their songs and stories with local residents, community and each other.

Tuned In

NSW Reconciliation Council are throwing a party with KOOLISM, BRIGGS, THE LAST KINECTION, TUKA, STUNNA SET and RAISING MONEY FOR HEAPS DECENT!

Home Base

Home Base is a new Heaps Decent program, which has been running out of the Redfern Community Centre for about two months now.

Heaps Decent at Producers Conference Melbourne

Heaps Decent were lucky enough to have been invited to talk at the Producers Conference in Melbourne a couple of weeks back, about what we do and how we do it.

Machine Atlas

SHOPFRONT: AUDITION CALL: OPEN WORKSHOP

Workshops: Wagga Wagga

It was an early start on the Wednesday morning; arriving in Wagga Wagga by 9.30am to get the workshops at the Riverina Juvenile Justice Centre underway meant an early trip to the airport.

Stunna Set perform at Yabun on Survival Day

Stunna Set perform at Yabun on Survival Day, 26th of January 2011.

Stunna Set: Good Vibes Rising

Our friends Stunna Set won the chance to perform at Good Vibrations in Sydney over the weekend as part of the Good Vibes Rising competition.

Heaps Decent win Best Collective at SMAC Awards

Last Thursday night FBi Radio held their third annual SMAC Awards, an awards ceremony dedicated to awarding ‘the artists, musos, venues, promoters, creators and culture makers who keep Sydney’s creative heart beating’. Heaps Decent was among five other nominees in the ‘Best Collective’ category, and we are very happy to announce that we won!

Yabun

Presented by Koori Radio, Yabun returns tomorrow for another celebration of Aborginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures.

At the Drive In

At the end of July 2010, myself and Sarah Emery from Shopfront went to Broken Hill and Wilcannia for half a week to work on Shopfront’s At The Drive-In project. At The Drive-In was an inspired take on b-grade zombie theatre featuring young people from Western Sydney and Broken Hill, NSW. The project resulted in performances in outdoor settings in Sydney and Broken Hill and was a pretty great success.

Heaps Decent at Key College

Every Monday in 2010 Heaps Decent ran a music class for the students at Key College. Key College is an independent high school in Redfern funded by Youth Off The Streets. We’ve been been working with Key College since 2008 and every year we get to make a selection of great new tracks with some talented young people.

Zombie Disco Squad and Vito from Aeroplane help Heaps Decent celebrate the new year

Happy new year from Heaps Decent! We headed back to Juniperina Juvenile Justice Centre in the first week of 2011 with producers Zombie Disco Squad and Vito De Luca from Aeroplane.

Heaps Decent Nominated for SMAC Award

Heaps Decent has been nominated for an award for ‘best collective’ in FBi Radio’s SMAC Awards.

Return to Wagga Wagga

Adam Bozzetto and I went back to Wagga Wagga last week. It was my first time in Wagga since June and it was good to be reacquainted with my homies at Riverina Juvenile Justice Centre and Riverina Community College over 3 days of music workshops

Tracks, remixes and video clips for our Detours and Destinations gang

Although we the Detours and Destinations project wrapped up a few months ago, we returned to Lomandra a few weeks ago – with gifts!

Adam and Key College’s Tom in the Studio

Last week, we took Key College’s Tom to Adam Bozzetto’s studio. With a penchant for Dubstep and Drum n’ Bass sounds, Tom and Adam spent some time walking through the studio set up and then started working on music ideas.

Klub Koori Xmas Hip Hop Jam

Koori Radio 93.7Fm, FBI Radio 94.5FM and Gadigal Music present the Klub Koori Xmas Hip Hop Jam at The Oxford Art Factory on Thursday December 16 from 8pm.

Our good friends at Shopfront are looking for young artists for ARTSLAB11

Our good friends at Shopfront are currently taking applications for their artist-in-residence program, ARTSLAB11.

Heaps Decent and Girlzone Program at Glebe Youth Centre

Back in early September, Heaps Decent spent a couple of Tuesdays at the Glebe Youth Centre as part of the Girlzone program.

AIME Strut the Streets

On the 3rd of December, the guys from Australian Indigenous Mentoring Experience are sending the message to Indigenous kids around the nation that there is no such thing as shame.

HEAPS DECENT’S ADAM BOZZETTO AND WAX MOTIF HEAD BACK TO WAGGA, OCTOBER 2010

It was time again for Danny aka Wax Motif and I to hit Wagga Wagga and the Riverina Juvenile Justice Centre. On the first trip out there with Danny, some awesome beats and raps were recorded so this time around we were there to finish them off.

YOU PLUS ME EQUALS US: STORIES OF RECONCILIATION

The NSW Reconciliation Council is launching their publication this week. You Plus Me Equals Us comprises eleven stories of experiences and topics ranging from the Stolen Generation to contemporary art.

Heaps Decent Parklife Volunteers

A massive THANK YOU! goes out to all our volunteers for the Parklife tour!

Neoteric is Heaps Decent

Earlier in the year we took our Canadian friend DJ Neoteric to the Miimali Youth workshops at two high schools in West Sydney for a day of songwriting and recording.

BRODINSKI, SINDEN, DJ MEHDI, JESSE ROSE AND AC SLATER FOR HEAPS DECENT

Heaps Decent was a hub of energy last week with three amazing workshops over three days; Heaps Decent playing host to a spate of world class producers, in town for the Parklife tour.

Heaps Decent and Fuzzy in Jetstar Magazine

Our super benefactor Fuzzy got a write up in Jetstar magazine and Fuzzy co-founder John Wall even gave Heaps Decent a little shout out!

Heaps Decent Spring Party!

Thanks for the Heaps Decent support on Friday night at the Heaps Decent Spring Party! It was a successful night down at Oxford Art Factory, a good time was had by all and funds were raised for furthering Heaps Decent projects.

Heaps Decent Spring Party Tonight

Tonight’s the night! The Heaps Decent Spring Party is upon us! Have you got your ticket yet?

Heaps Decent Pack

We have a bunch of MAD DECENT prize packs to give away tonight at the Heaps Decent Spring Party!

FREE DOWNLOAD: THE ASTON SHUFFLE’S REMIX OF ‘LATE NIGHT’

It’s day 2 of our remix a day frenzy! Yesterday we gave away the super funky Toni Toni Lee remix of ‘Miimali Gang Stars’. Today we’re gonna take the tempo up a bit….This is the remix that the lovely fellas The Aston Shuffle did of another Detours and Destinations track, ‘Late Night’, by the girls over at Miimali Aborginal Youth Services.

Insight Prize Pack

The guys at INSIGHT have donated this ace prize pack!

SPANK RECORDS PRIZE PACK

The crew at the universe’s favourite record store, SPANK RECORDS, have donated another fabulous prize pack for the Heaps Decent Spring Party raffle!

Something Else Pack

We’re super stoked to have been donated two prize packs for tonight’s raffle by SOMETHING ELSE to add to the already sensational list of raffle prizes!

OYSTER MAGAZINE SUBSCRIPTION

Another day, another smashing raffle prize for the Heaps Decent Spring Party raffle!!! This time, it’s OYSTER MAG with a year’s subscription to their brilliant mag!

Pablo Calamari’s Remix of ‘We’re Going to Lomandra’

Pablo Calamari is our good friend. You might know him better as one half of the club duo Act Yo Age, or maybe by his old alias Elroy. The dude is a club veteran and he has brought all of his wisdom to his remix of The Lomandra Crew’s “We’re Going To Lomandra”. This percussion heavy, tropical BEAST is perfect for getting that crowd moving. Hopefully they’ll join in with the lyrics too (“Ay! Ay! What’s your name?”)!

Heap Decent in Brag Magazine

Check out Heaps Decent featured in this weeks issue of The Brag.

DOWNLOAD TONI TONI LEE’S REMIX OF MIIMALI GANG STARS

We’re going to put up a new remix today, tomorrow and Friday to get you PSYCHED UP for our party on Friday. Please spread the word because these new remixes are AWESOME!