Dappled Cities Busk for Charity in Sydney

On Thursday morning, Australian indie-rockers Dappled Cities took their craft to the streets to raise money for charity. Singers Tim Derricourt and Dave Rennick of the Sydney-based band headed downtown to help give a big sendoff to the departing morning DJs of legendary Australian radio station Triple J and help out Nordoff Robbins Music Therapy in the process. Derricourt tells Spinner that his bandmate came armed with street performing experience.

"I'm not a busker. Dave has busked because he's the one who's more desperate for money," Derricourt chuckles. "He's stopped busking now, but he's had some experience in that area. But yeah, we just had a good time... We busked on the main thoroughfare in Sydney, but then we got to promote a charity which is nice."

The outfit, who released their latest album, 'Zounds,' just a couple months ago on Danger Bird Records, actually pulled from other musicians' catalogs for the experience, including 'Wind of Change' by the Scorpions, 'Streets of Philadelphia' by Bruce Springsteen and Johnny Cash's 'Ring of Fire.'

"It was actually quite a mournful set, now that I think of it. But it was stuff we felt like playing," Derricourt says. "There was no rehearsal, but they're songs that are in your mind all the time so when it comes to singing them, you can just bash it out like any sort of karaoke [singer] would."

As for their own record, it too is emotional, although not in a mournful way. Rennick previously told Spinner the group wanted to make something "big and broad and expansive," to follow up 2006's 'Granddance,' and they did so by expanding their numbers in the studio.

"We had a string quartet come in," he says. "We also had a French horn player and a flautist come in. It was just all in the aim of expansion, involving more people and -- I sound pretty corporate -- but yeah, expanding."

The band didn't quite make it to NYC in October for CMJ as they once planned to, but Derricourt said they are gearing up to journey stateside in early 2010.

"We're desperate to," he says. "We're kind of trying to juggle between England and American next year so we're gonna definitely make them our priority starting from about February."