So, it’s been a little while since we unleashed the sheer muscular grunt of the Chariot of the Sun on the unsuspecting roads of Australia.

What has it been up to? Well apart from attracting the Federal Police and Irish backpackers (you think we’re joking…), the Empire of the Sun’s Chariot has appropriately enough been lounging on Bondi Beach and touring the Sydney sights.

Keep an eye out for it in Sydney whilst it’s still in our hands and not being polished in the garage of its soon-to-be-proud owner. For your chance to win the Sun Chariot, enter at www.sunchariot.com.au.

I was so stoked this week to find out that Mr. Glenny G and myself will be driving Empire Of The Sun’s CHARIOT from Brisbane to Sydney this coming Sunday.

We’ll be picking the beast up Sunday morning and swiftly moving down through the Sunshine Coast into Byron Bay. Come say hello to us if you see it (we’re super friendly people, seriously) AND WE’LL HAVE SOME CD GIVEAWAYS TOO!!!

If you want to be part of the action LIVE – then we’re going to be ‘tweeting’ the whole thing from our @eyesandearsoz account.

Tell all your friends who live along the coast that we’ll be making the journey and to follow! (Especially if the car breaks down and we need to crash at someone’s house for the week while the engine is being completely restored).

So the ARIA Awards, huh… Where to start!?

“An evening of epic proportions” just doesn’t do it justice… November 26, 2009 certainly was the Day of The Empire, but did someone say ROBBIE WILLIAMS, and Keith Urban too!?

So I can’t deny the red carpet was fun (PS keep an eye out for our own Jukebox from Hell’s Darryl B escorting Robbie Williams down the red rug), the performances were breathtaking (check out the on-stage pyrotechnics during Walking On A Dream), and the afterparty went past dawn… but the real highlights of the evening were Empire of the Sun cleaning up every major award of the night. That makes a total of seven ARIA awards, including Artisans, for Emperor Steele and Lord Littlemore.

Emperor Steele represented Empire of the Sun to accept all four awards on the evening, thanking Lord Littlemore, Donnie Sloan, Pete Lusty, Luke’s stunning wife Snappy Dolphin, his parents, all us at EMI (high fives all around!), and the incredible creative team behind Empire, including Mathematics and Debaser. Check out all of Emperor Steele’s awards speeches below:

Robbie Williams‘ performance of Bodies blew the roof off, as did his brown leather brogues and self-confessed dad robot dance moves. Young ladies screamed appropriately:

And don’t forget you can, for the first time, purchase and download the 2009 ARIA Awards live performances from Robbie, Keith, the Temper Trap, Lisa Mitchell, Kate Miller-Heidke, Sarah Blasko, Ladyhawke, the Hilltop Hoods, and Jess Mauboy’s  fromthe Australian iTunes Store. All the proceeds from the sale of the live digital tracks will be donated Youth Beyond Blue, the youth arm of beyond blue: the national depression initiative.

Congratulations to all the winners and our nominees Paul Dempsey, Bob Evans, JET, The Cat Empire, Bindi Irwin, and Rodney Rude.

LONG LIVE THE EMPIRE!

Serious kudos to these dedicated Empyreans, who re-enacted Empire of the Sun’s We Are The People video in its entirety!

Originally shot in the deserts and rainforests of Mexico, the re-enactment was filmed on the sunny shores of Sydney, Australia and features Sydney actress Angie Kai as Gretel the Sun Goddess. Whoever plays Emperor Steele and Lord Littlemore, come forth and identify yourselves – your Yothu Yindi dancing is brilliant!

Amazing effort, particularly the Mexican festival at the end.

Emperor Steele has taken out the 2009 GQ Man Of The Year Award in the Music Act Of The Year category!With tight competition within in the music category, Luke Steele has beaten Daniel Merriweather, Wolfmother and fellow EMI label mates, Keith Urban and JET.Staged inside the historical Great Hall of Sydney University on Thursday night, the GQ Awards honoured leading Australian men across the arts, sport, politics, business and community service. Luke was unable to attend the awards ceremony due to upcoming touring commitments but recorded this brilliant acceptance speech played to all those in attendance. Don’t forget to check out the Special Edition (2CD) version of Walking On A Dream available from today and don’t miss the Empire perform live at next week’s ARIA Awards, Thursday November 26.

Luke will also appear on the special gatefold cover of the 2009 GQ Men of the Year Awards issue on sale November 25.

Go the Empire!

Ahhhh, album artwork… a special kind of magic happens when an inspired graphic designer or photographer meets an incredible musician.

There were no surprises when Empire of the Sun was nominated for a Best Album Artwork ARIA this year – & we bet ya they’ll be taking home all the pointy silver awards this year! The man behind the artwork is Dave Homer of Debaser, and from Nov 6 the brand new Mart Gallery in Surry Hills will be exhibiting a collection of works interpreting some of his favourite album covers of all time.

In fact, Mart Gallery will be a pretty good place to find where music meets art over the upcoming months… It was opened specifically to exhibit artists & photographs who specialise in music art.

Through December & January Tony Mott & Sophie Howarth will have some of the most iconic photographs from Big Day Out’s gone by. Soon after, our good mate and talented music-photographer Daniel Boud (he took our mug shots on the Contact page), and music design buffs “We Buy Your Kids” who are responsible for Paul Dempsey’s artwork will also feature.

Follow Mart Gallery on Twitter or check out their Tumblr at www.martgallery.tumblr.com.
And for more of the music-slash-artwork-cleverness, check out the awesome music artwork blog www.sleevage.com.

What does WILL.I.AM of the Black Eyed Peas think about just before he hops on stage? Why, Empire of the Sun of course!?

Fuzzy from Video Hits interviewed the BEPs at ACER Arena (full interview broadcast this Sunday), literally 1 hour before they went on stage last Friday night. It would seem that Apple and WILL.I.AM are massive Empire of the Sun fans and they love poppin’ Empire tracks in their DJ sets.

Check out the gorgeous new TVC for eBay featuring Empire Of The Sun’s Walking On A Dream.

Part of a brand spanking new advertising campaign which will be blasted across France!

Yeah!

EMPIRE OF THE SUN
JET
KEITH URBAN

…are all nominated for GQ Men Of The Year 2009 Awards in the ‘Music Act Of The Year’ category!

Vote for our guys at http://moty.gq.com.au/categories/

…and who’s better qualified to recreate the colourful psychedelia of The Empire than these crazy cats!?

Skip forward to 12mins to hear Metronomy’s mimalist vocoder-laden take of Empire of the Sun’s We Are The People.

Hmmm… we seem to be having some issues with this embeddable player. If the above player isn’t working for you, head to triple j to listen in full.