SOUTHEAST DESERT METAL
THEY ARE Australia’s most remote crew of diehard shredheads, local to the outback town of Ltyntye Apurte (about 80km South of Alice Springs) but making their vicious and visceral spin on hard-rock heard all around the country. With strong ties to family, community and culture at their core, the quartet use their art to tell stories as powerful and authentic as their sound.
THEY SOUND LIKE what your tastebuds hear when you munch down on a big, juicy habenero pepper – pure, unrelenting spice in sonic form. The riffs at play are absolutely monstrous, Chris Wallace and Gavin Hayes tearing out serpentine soundscapes of unrelenting fury as if they were fighting off dragons with their fretboards. Add in Wallace’s captivating knack for narrative, and you’ve got a brutal brew of stories and shredding unlike anything you’ve ever heard before.
YOU’LL DIG THEM IF YOU LIKE Iron Maiden, AC/DC and Black Sabbath – their style is heavily rooted in the gruff and guttural heavy metal uprising that drove the ‘80s insane, with a distinct edge of modern flavours lingering in the breakdowns.
YOU SHOULD CHECK OUT 2018’s BreakTheSilence album, which is not only fantastic for how it weaves contemporary metal styles with elements of their Indigenous Australian culture, but also just for how crazily well all four of these legends gel when they jam out – the full-band dynamic on this record is next-level.