Violent Soho

by Heather Phares Brisbane, Australia’s Violent Soho revives the fuzzed-out rock of the early ‘90s, borrowing Weezer’s crunchy guitars and Nirvana’s distortion-coated hooks. Featuring guitarists/vocalists Luke Boerdam and James Tidswell, bassist Luke Henery, and drummer Michael Richards, the band formed in 2004, when the foursome were going to school together. After playing local shows for a while, they released their first EP, Pigs & TV, in 2006; the praise it drew allowed the band to tour Sydney and Melbourne. Violent Soho’s debut album We Don’t Belong Here arrived in 2008, the same year they played the St. Jerome’s Laneway Festival. The album received airplay on the band’s hometown station 4ZZZ as well as the nationwide Triple J. It also reached the ears of Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore, who signed Violent Soho to his Ecstatic Peace label in 2009. The band reworked some tracks from We Don’t Belong Here and added some new songs, resulting in their second album and U.S. debut, Violent Soho, which arrived in early 2009.