Hip Mo' Toast

Hip Mo’ Toast‘s beginnings were humble but auspicious – in early 1997, four jazz students at the Western Australian Academy Of Performing Arts realised the need for a jazz band that was entertaining and made people feel good! The band landed a regular gig at the Ultralounge, a Mount Lawley restaurant, and played there for the better part of a year, even before coming up with a name for themselves, which proved to be a more difficult task than was ever thought possible. How to find a simple phrase that summed up the enigma that was causing hundreds of happy diners to become expert finger-snappers every Wednesday night? Well after many band meetings and bottles of red wine it was decided. Hip, because they are, Mo’, because it sounds good, and Toast, because everyone loves toast!

The young Hip Mo’ Toast cut their collective chompers on restaurant gigs and parties, and were soon being clamoured for further afield, and to date have played literally thousands of performances from family picnics to international jazz festivals.

Hip Mo’ Toast performance highlights to date include the Perth International Festival Verandah Club (2004), luxury ocean liner MV Europa (2004), Fremantle International Jazz Festival (2001), South Perth Fiesta (2001, 2002, 2003), the Geraldton Sea Jazz Spectacular (1998, 1999, 2000), York Jazz Festival (1998) and annual performances for the Perth Jazz Society, Jazz Fremantle and the Jazz Club of WA.

A year after the band’s birth, Hip Mo’ Toast was asked to augment itself for a performance at the Perth Zoo’s Centenary celebration. The opportunity was not wasted and the quartet became the awesome fourteen-piece all-star Hip Mo’ Toast Big Band, boasting a nine-piece horn section carefully selected from Perth’s leading jazzmen. Within a year, the big band had landed a Friday residency at the now-defunct Greenwich Bar. Following Greenwich’s closure, the big band took its roof-raising antics to the Varga Lounge, where it stayed for an unbelievable 15 months. During this time the big band recorded its first EP, Hip Mo’ Toast Big Band Live, which is itself a testimonial to the vibe this band creates.

The quartet was still doing well and became a quintet to further the cause. Having already made a commercially successful demo album (Introducing Hip Mo’ Toast) in 1999, the quintet decided to go for the big guns and in 2002 recorded a full-length studio album, Uptown Tight. Hip Mo’ Toast featured songs from this album on two tours (2001, 2002) to Sydney and Melbourne where they played at the Basement and Bennett’s Lane respectively. Hip Mo’ Toast won the 2000 Perth Jazz Society Award in recognition of “artistic excellence in performance and outstanding contribution by a group in the area of innovation and jazz advocacy” and has won the Western Australian Music Industry Association Award for Best Original Jazz Act for six consecutive years – 2000 - 2005.

In December of 2003 the Hip Mo’ Toast Big Band released ‘Mischievous Girl’ - a new full-length big band studio album featuring many of the band members’ original compositions. The album puts guest vocalist James Flynn to work and also brings to rip-roaring life an arrangement written especially for the Hip Mo’ Toast Big Band by the one and only Maestro Tommy Tycho.

Led by Perth’s leading jazz vocalist Libby Hammer, Hip Mo’ Toast continues to work around town at jazz clubs and private functions to ever-increasing acclaim, whilst also nurturing plans to spread their wings and take a little more to the sky in the future - so keep your eyes peeled!