Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever: 2019

Australia’s Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever has a knack for writing songs that are tough but tender, danceable but not dance tracks that expand into eminently beautiful jams. The band's excellent 2018 album, Hope Downs, was lauded by the music blogosphere as one of the most accomplished debuts of the year, and the band has spent much of the past two years on tour, very far from home.

Based out of Melbourne, the quintet is frequently compared to Brisbane forebears the Go-Betweens, but Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever’s influences are more wide-ranging, skittering from Afrobeat to Krautrock. Lyrically, the group’s three guitarists, singers and songwriters — Fran Keany, Tom Russo and Joe White — reflect on contemporary and personal concerns, from Australia’s chaotic politics to the anxious pace of life. The rhythm section of bassist Joe Russo, Tom’s brother, and drummer Marcel Tussie is fierce and funky.

Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever came by Studio A to play two new singles, not found on Hope Downs but a double A-sided single released earlier this year, and they talked about the journey that brought these brothers, cousins, and friends together as one of Australia’s most electrifying young bands.

[Recorded: 5/22/19; Engineer: Jim O'Hara; Producer: Sarah Wardrop]