So 2012 turned out to be a pretty good year. Lots of great shows, boozing and meeting Mick Jones.

We put on a bunch of gigs through out the last 12 months, the biggest one being this years Revolution Rock gigs which commemorated the 10th year since Joe Strummers passing away. We travelled to 4 states over October and partied with so many awesome bands and people including Brisbane and Adelaide which were two of the funnest shows ever. It was a marathon series of shows but was a awesome way to celebrate Joe and raise some solid cash for Strummerville.

Whilst on the topic of things Joe Strummer-ish, 2012 saw Paperbag Music  go to Europe for the Strummer of Love Festival which turned out to be a pretty awesome event with so many great bands (plus not many festivals let you bring your own booze)

The crowd was really awesome with a distinct lack of flag capes and sluzzas and heaps of hugs and Clash shirts. The whole trip was pretty excellent and the highlight would of been running into Mick Jones (all suited up) on a train station in the English country side.

Other highlights included crashing a bike in Berlin, seeing Pete Doherty, Billy Bragg, The Pogues & Roots Manuva and some how not dying in Amsterdam.

2012 also saw some pretty amazing new bands come along. Everything I Own Is Broken started playing this year and their ep will be amazing. Chris Burrows new thing This Is a Robbery came out and (of course being Chris) was brilliant  We also came across some great bands like Obat Batuk, Amateur Drunks and Ivan and the Backpackers. Our old mates The Smith St Band made a great new album and played about 20 billion gigs and traveled to the states and China. It fells like only yesterday we booked a young Wil Wagner and he took all the drink tickets.

The Bennies have been touring heaps locally and over in Japan and have a new EP out soon! We were also fortunate enough to do a couple of shows with The Tearaways. it was awesome to see the boys back in action.

We also did our first run of shows with the amazing Sweet Teens and they were great (even if they support AFL) and their next release will be crazy good!

We wrapped things up with a great end of year show in Sydney the other weekend. It was probably one of the funnest gigs we’ve done in  a while. Not only was it a great lineup, each band totally nailed their sets. The crowd was well oiled and ready to party and the whole show a awesome time and reminded me why we put gigs on. We must give a massive shout out to everyone involved!

Provided the world doesn’t go down the shitter, 2013 looks to be another great year of music, gigs and trolling certain online music press for being shit at music journalism.

To wrap things up, Paperbag Music is going to go on a long break for a while. We may be back after a bit of a hiatus for more good times.

Thanks to all the bands and everyone who came out to any gigs this year.

Cheers,

PBM