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DJs Bombs Away break into Billboard Charts before Whistler visit

Having a hit song is great timing as Aussie brothers hit Garf's on March 11
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Fast-rising stars

Bombs Away are celebrating a big career moment. It's not their upcoming gig at Garfinkel's in Whistler, though Sketch, one half of the DJing siblings, is pretty pleased about that.

Known on their driver's licenses as Matthew and Thomas Coleman (a.k.a. Tommy Shades), the Australian brothers, DJs, producers and vocalists, have hit the Billboard Music Charts for the first time. They're at number 42 with their new single "Better Luck Next Time."

"It's kind of an accident, just great timing with this song. It's the first time we've been mainstream. A lot of our stuff has been online. A lot of our exposure has been organic through Facebook, Soundcloud and Twitter," says Sketch, in a phone interview from his home on the Gold Coast.

"And MTV America has just added 'Better Luck Next Time,' which is quite good for us. We're not strictly touring that song but it is the one that is out at the moment."

Crossing over from Facebook to Billboard has been a matter of taking "a different road."

"'Better Luck Next Time' was a slightly more serious song for us than the party stuff that we usually do. We are very much club and festival oriented and when radio picked us up it's a bonus," Sketch says. "But this song is aimed more at a mainstream market and we're super stoked that it's gone so well. It's platinum in Australia, Top 10 in several countries in Europe and now Billboard.

"Hopefully, it's got a little further to go as well. I don't think it's out in the U.K. yet, or Spain and Germany. Those are our strongest markets over there."

Sketch says they've been performing since 2009, adding Bombs Away have a higher profile in Europe and their home country, where they have made other gold and platinum hits with club songs like "Supersoaker" and "Party Bass."

Their March 11 gig at Garf's is part of a month-long tour of Canada and the U.S. This will be their first visit to Whistler, Sketch adds.

"Whistler's always been somewhere we wanted to check out. There are so many Australians there. Everybody who comes back home talks about how brilliant it is," he says.

"It's been high on our list... We do a lot of shows in Asia, like Singapore and Bali, not because the cities are particularly big, but because almost everyone who comes to our shows go home back to Europe, or back, to America and then they know us. This is why Whistler is so great."

Sketch and Tom will play at Garf's alongside their full-time DJ, Dixie.

"Dixie's pretty much our regular DJ now. The show's evolved from Tommy and I being the DJs and doing some vocal work, to singing the whole time," he says.

The music has evolved with Bombs Away concentrating on creating original music, rather than sampling.

"It hasn't been a conscious decision not to (sample), but often if we start a song and use samples, or another track, we end up not being able to find exactly what we want, so we thought, 'Bugger it, we'll just do it ourselves!'" Sketch laughs.

"Actually, I love how things got started for us. We never really planned to be vocalists or rappers, we saw ourselves as DJs and producers, but over the last 18 months our videos don't have us DJing, fans don't even realize we can do that. It's been a weird evolution for it."

The three will spend a few days at the resort in order take a timeout on the mountains.

"Everybody's already in Whistler to party so we're definitely bringing that full circle. It's our last show in Canada, so we're going to make it a party for ourselves as well. It should be pretty crazy," Sketch says.

"We have three or four days there. That's why we finished in Whistler, we want to hit the slopes before the American tour. We've been looking forward to this for quite a while."

Sketch is full of good words about Bombs Away's upcoming release, "Mother Truckers," which is due out next month.

"That's another straight-down-the-line club song," he says.