Presenter Announcement – Nick Smethurst
Nick Smethurst is a musician and creative enabler. Since his early corruption by the hand of local music at 15 years of age, he has sought to do little else.
Nick runs the one-man concern known as In Finland. As need dictates, he has operated a venue (610 Ann Street, 2005-2007), booked for several festivals (Straight Out Of Brisbane 2006, SOOBiesta 2006, No Culture 2007-2008, Valley Fiesta 2009), and helped bring some of the world's better underground bands to Brisbane (Why?, Jens Lekman, Neon Indian, Calvin Johnson etc). He is also part of the team behind the Moth club nights held in Brisbane. Thanks to a particularly stubborn set of ethics, Nick's quietly outspoken views have often placed him at odds with much of the mainstream Arts community, which has a lot to do with why he likes to appear on panels. Nick is also a noted instrumentalist, currently playing with both Lion Island (Bouzouki, Guitar, Singing) and Epithets (Singing, Songwriting, Guitar), and having contributed in past to Mr Maps, Carry Nation, Let's Not (but say we did) and others. Since escaping an ill-advised tryst with the corporate world in 2008, Nick is rarely found doing much outside of the creative world, though his "day job" involves providing therapy to children with Autism. Otherwise, he can usually be found in either a guitar store or Japanese restaurant. There are no photos of him without either a guitar or the Wu-Tang hand sign involved. He is sorry for this.
