Melbourne-based band Fancy Weapon are one of those once in a lifetime gatherings of some legendary antipodean indie musicians who have come together like metal filings on a magnet and create something whole and truly magnificent. They have been playing together over the past few years and the membership is a who’s who of the industry.
There’s the legendary Mick Turner from Dirty Three, who has also played with Moodists (alongside Dave Graney and Clare Moore) and more recently Backseat Mafia favourites Mess Esque and Bleak Squad). He’s not just a pillar of the local antipodean musical scene, he’s part of the very foundations.
He is joined by Claire Birchall has been making music for the last 30-odd years with Paper Planes and the Phantom Hitchhikers in Melbourne, and is a mainstay of Kim Salmon’s Smoked Salmon project (another regular feature in Backseat Mafia). Her most recent solo album is 2024’s ‘The Haunting’. In Fancy Weapon, Birchall plays drums and co-wrote and sung a handful of songs on the forthcoming first album.
Also in the band is Joel Silbersher who played in legendary underground bands GOD and Hoss in the 90s. He has also worked with The Sunset Strip, Charlie Owens (in the duo Tendrils), played occasional bass for the Dirty Three, Tex Perkins and the Simon Juliff Band.
And last but not least there is Guy Maddison came out of the 80’s Perth Punk Rock scene in the band Greenhouse Effect. He later joined the iconic Lubricated Goat. He later moved to Seattle where he joined Mudhoney in 2001, replacing original bassist Matt Lukin, and remains with them to this day.
The first single for the band is ‘Squid’ – a noisy chaotic and viscous track that is filled with fuzzy guitars and a wild shambolic delivery. It’s like a runaway freight train without brakes, that seems about to fall apart any any second but remains intact to the very end. And delivers.
The wall of music carries a soaring, urgent melody delivered by Birchall with backing vocals, an underlying pop sensibility under the razor blade scythe.
The accompanying video was produced by Birchall with live footage by Bec Birchall.
‘Squid’ is out today and available via all the usual sites.
It comes off the debut self-titled album, being released on 19 June through Poison City Records. You can pre-order here.
The album was recorded in a single session at Finn Keane’s Head Gap studios in Preston in late 2024, about a week before the studio burned to the ground after a neighbouring business was criminally torched. Further mixing sessions were completed at another venue under the name Head Gap. The album was engineered by Finn Keane and produced by Finn and Fancy Weapon.
