The Underground Stage
“MEOW MEOW AND THE SMACKOUTS are savage with a smile, tartan-trousers punk with a grin a mile wide and sharp poise for days and days and days. There’s the snot, the snarl, and the snark, but there’s also instantly addictive song underneath it all, a blinding blast of noisy trouble.” Gallery Listen
“Madly urgent, Good Ramen’s set is insistent without losing any humour, a full bag of smart mischief and feral shenanigans that snaps like a set of grinning jaws.” Gallery Listen
Every week, I take a look at the best playlists in Australia and the biggest playlists in the world and analyse the artists appearing on them. All of these playlists focus on newly-released tracks – what this means is that these lists can be seen as the bets that critics and tastemakers are making on […]
As ever, all the tracks that make it onto the playlist are aces in my book but if I absolutely, positively had to pick no more than five to check out this week, it’d be these.
Every week, I scour the latest releases from emerging, DIY, and independent artists in Australia. The best of them end up on the playlist. Follow The Playlist Listen to this week’s edition here, 100% made up of the best brand-new music from the best new artists in Australia – never pay-to-play, and always only releases […]
“Bennetts Grove clang and haunt, a menace and a ringing bag of damage, delivered with aim and purpose, filthy and scuffed and noisy as all of hell. Fabulous.” Gallery Listen
“The Engine smash post-punk and noise-rock and big songs and RATM guitar squalls and squeals into a batty package of hyperactively aggressive chaos that hammers and hammers and hammers at your skull until it collapses into pieces and it doesn’t ever take a breath and it’s exhaustingly mad but you just keep going and trying […]
“Our Mutual Friend swagger without moving too fast, damage the flesh without too much effort. Giant slabs of post-hardcore noise, with deft touches of colour.” Gallery Listen
If you do it wrong, SXSW can be exhausting, complicated, and bad for your health. Do it right, and… well, it’ll still be all those things, but in the fun way. I’ve been to SXSW in Austin a bunch of times as well as to both the inaugural SXSW Sydney events in 2023 and 2024, […]