With their combination of hard hitting riffs and no-nonsense attitude, Rose Tattoo quickly became heroes of the Aussie rock scene in the late 70s. The missing link between AC/DC and Cold Chisel, the band had an incendiary frontman in Angry Anderson, which also gave them an easily recognisable brand. Their first two albums, 1978’s ‘Rose Tattoo’ and 1981’s ‘Assault & Battery’ remain firm favourites among fans.
Tag Archives: aussie
EVOLETAH – Run With The Hunted
Led by vocalist/multi-instrumentalist Matt Cahill, Evoletah began life as a guitar driven rock band. Their first two albums were enjoyable to a point, but didn’t really do anything that would make them stand out in a world of other similar bands. In 2013, their ‘We Ache For The Moon’ presented something of a rebirth, with the band exploring jazz, rock and pop in a fusion that sounded almost cinematic. It had almost nothing to connect it to anything that’d come before, but it was superb and found a place as one of the year’s best albums. It was, and remains, a record that showcased a lot of musical talent, a broad musical imagination and a willingness to cut the strings of expectation. By doing what came naturally rather than trying to craft a broadly appealing alt-rock hit, the Australian band created an underground masterpiece.
ALCHEMY – Infinite Forms Of Torture EP
Alchemy formed in 2018 and quickly made their presence felt on the Aussie metal scene with regular live shows and a string of support slots. Their debut EP shares their love of traditional death metal sounds with the wider world, showing them to be more than capable of reviving the brutal sounds of Cannibal Corpse, Deicide and others with a genuine conviction.
FANGZ – For Nothing EP
Although sometimes closer to trashy hard rock than straight punk or pop punk, this debut EP from Sydney’s self-proclaimed “party punks” is the kind of recording that grabs the attention straight away, regardless of genre preference. With a primary goal (in the band’s own words) of “getting people to drink beer and do backflips in mosh pits”, there’s always got an interest in stoking up good times, so you might expect something tossed off and frivolous…but the reality is far more complex. Digging deeper into the songs themselves, ‘For Nothing’ is the kind of debut that shows off a band that understands the benefits of a strong arrangement. Nothing here feels hacked out or too simple and yet the songs still value the kind of directness that’s capable of pulling in the listener from the very first spin.
GIANT DWARF – Giant Dwarf
Every once in a while, a band comes along that sounds almost exactly like their logo and album artwork. This is one of those times. With a sound that falls somewhere between heavy psych and stoner rock, Perth’s Giant Dwarf deliver a world of fantastic riffs on this debut album. These guys have so obviously realised that it can be more effective to take influence from others and do that well, as opposed to presenting an odd mish-mash of more original sounds but end up with a record that’s going to be perhaps quite marginal. It’s resulted in a release that’s full of belters that fall somewhere between classic ‘Dopes’ era Monster Magnet and the more focused Queens of The Stone Age – pretty much guaranteed to please most listeners who loved stoner and space rock in the late 90s…and still find themselves craving some deep fuzz.