When three members of Nitidus get together to form a new project, you know it has to be something special.  The original Australian line-up of Ash Fyfe, Kristian “Doc” Grondman and Marki Miklic have teamed up with our good friend Suzy Ferguson (Exile, Lustre) to create Arabela, a new venture into rock, metal and prog.

The band has bunkered themselves into Ash’s studio creating the foundations of their debut album, but they have released some demos of the work completed so far.  Check ‘em out, and look for Arabela on a stage near you!

Calling all New Zealanders, if you haven’t seen Shadow Puppet in action, you’re missing the best cover band to come out of Christchurch.  The band features Nitidus’ very own Patrick Clemenger on vocals, plus his brother Luke Clemenger from Powershred on bass and ex-Nitidus drummer Tom Brownlee.

Get connected with this power trio on Facebook or Myspace to find out where they will be performing next!

Thanks to Myspace’s new profile designs, I’ve given the Nitidus page a much needed spruce up. Go check out www.myspace.com/nitidus

Merry Christmas to all the Nitidus fans around the world.  We hope you are all having a great time with family and friends, drinking up, eating well and sharing gifts… or sharing gift vouchers for those special hard-to-buy-for people in your lives.  No doubt many of you are sitting there right now with a new iTunes gift card in hand wondering what the hell to spend those $20 worth of credits on.

Hey, that reminds me, did you know Nitidus have tracks available on iTunes?   Is that a coincidence or what?

Seriously though, they’re only 99c each so why not pick up a track or three today and give your iPod/iPhone/etc some Nitidus lovin’.  It’s ridiculously easy too, just click on the link below:

Share the love and have an awesome new year!

Back in early 2006, we put a call out for anyone who wanted to appear in a new Nitidus video clip.  Thanks again to everyone who rocked out with us as we captured the Nitidus rock show on film.  Unfortunately, due to certain unresolved issues at the time, the video was never completed… or so we thought.

More than 3 years later, the original music video for ‘Red Morning‘ has been discovered alive and well on YouTube!  Check it out:

‘Red Morning‘ is the track that won Nitidus the Hard Rock Artist of the Year award at the 16^th Annual Los Angeles Music Awards, and is available on the EP ‘Still Here‘.  This video was directed & edited by Johnny Lukacs with assistant director Adam Papuga, who are also the team that brought you Rook‘s video for their song ‘New Guy‘.

Thanks to Naomi and Ash for the heads up, and Merry Christmas to all the Nitidus fans out there!

It’s been a while, but we’re back! You might remember us from such bands as Nitidus, Shotgun Zero and The West Melbourne Brass Band 12th Division. We’re dusting off the drums, guitars, mics and some of the old songs for one more night of rock n’ roll.

In fact, I don’t want to alarm you, but this may actually be your last chance to see us perform these songs for the rest of the year, so if you want to hear The Taste, What’s It Gonna Be and other such nonsense… Saturday night is your night baby!

Get on down to the Three Crowns pub in West Melbourne at 9pm. More details via the FaceSpaceTwit page for those into that sort of thing.

Here’s an interview we did for Inpress Magazine a few months back for those who didn’t get to read it before.

What do you think is your band’s greatest strength?
Adam Kurzel, guitar/vocals: “Falling through stage floors, getting locked out of our own gig, touring America with seven people in an RV for five weeks and playing 4:30am gigs.”

What was your worst gig ever and why?
“Never a bad gig, except maybe for 4:30am ones; just happy to play and always on the look out for new places new people and new opportunities.”

If you could time travel back to any gig in history which would it be and why?
“Playing at the Whiskey A-Go-Go in LA in 2007. An amazing and surreal experience knowing the music and people who had graced the stage in years gone by. It’s a damn impressive wall of rock’n'roll fame.”

What movie do you think your music would best accompany and why?
“Our songs would have been featured in Watchmen, but Zack Snyder never called. I’m sure the movie will be fine even without our tracks.”

What are your plans for the immediate future? And the rest of the year?
“Upcoming Melbourne shows at Curtin Bandroom, Ruby’s Belgrave and Northcote Social Club. We aim to hit the studio to record later in the year.”

Favourite “pick me up for a bug night” drink?
“Jägerbomb or a shot of scotch whisky, that’ll put hairs on ya chest. [Drummer] Doc and [bassist] Marki are living proof.”

In case you missed it, Shotgun Zero had their first gig last week at Musicland. Check out the full story over at the Shotgun Zero website.

With Nitidus now officially on indefinite hiatus, Marki, Adam and myself (Doc) have reformed under the name Shotgun Zero.

After performing several shows as a three piece (including an incredible show with the Hoodoo Gurus) and writing some exciting new songs, it became clear that the Nitidus name was no longer relevant to the band we have become.  It has been a long and gruelling struggle to find a new name, but we finally picked Shotgun Zero and are now moving ahead to create more new sounds.

Be sure to subscribe to the Shotgun Zero blog to get all the latest news on upcoming Shotgun Zero events.

Spread the word, Shotgun Zero is here and ready to rock your world!

It has been a long time coming, but today we’re officially announcing that Nitidus is on indefinite hiatus and will no longer be performing in the foreseeable future.  To paraphrase Billy Gould at the break up of Faith No More in 1998, The decision among the members is mutual, and there will be no pointing of fingers, no naming of names, other than stating, for the record, that ‘PC started it’.

Early in 2008, lead singer Patrick “PC” Clemenger made the hard decision to move back to New Zealand to start a family, while Nitidus continued to perform around Melbourne as a three-piece with Marki, Adam and myself (Doc).  The four of us reunited once more in February 2009 for the A.R.E.A. 9 festival in New Zealand, where we had an absolute blast.  We had great creative chemistry, despite not having played together in almost a year.  When the three of us inevitably returned to Australia, we no longer wanted to continue as Nitidus without founding member PC on the mic.  As a three piece, we feel that the band has changed significantly, and so it was agreed to hang up the Nitidus name.

We’d like to thank everyone who has supported us over the years, we couldn’t have come this far without you.  We hope you will continue to support us in our next endeavours, but more on that soon.

PC, Marki, Adam and Doc remain on good terms and continue to be active musicians.  You haven’t seen the last of us, so make sure you’re subscribed to this blog for news in the near future.

So long… for now.