Fun Lovin' Criminals return with a seventh album that proves reinvention suits them just fine.
Fun Lovin’ Criminals are coming to Melbourne, and if you know what’s good for you, you’ll be there.
After 15 years of silence, Fun Lovin’ Criminals have returned not with a whimper but with a proper statement. Founding member Brian ‘Fast’ Leiser, drummer Frank Benbini and new guitarist Naim Cortazzi, a genuine world-class player, have pieced together something that feels both deeply familiar and genuinely fresh. Huey Morgan’s departure in 2021 could have easily been the end of the story, but Leiser and Benbini clearly weren’t done. A Matter of Time, the band’s seventh album, is the result of that determination, and it’s a strong one.
Recorded with Grammy-winning engineer Tim Latham, the album sounds genuinely grand; rich soundscapes, complex arrangements, without losing the raw, gritty groove the band built their reputation on. Cortazzi’s guitar work is all over this thing, layered and colourful, giving A Matter of Time more guitar muscle than anything in the FLC catalogue.
Fun Lovin’ Criminals
- 13 March – Kindred Band Room, Melbourne
- Tickets: here
Check out our gig guide, our festival guide, our live music venue guide and our nightclub guide. Follow us on Instagram here.
View this post on Instagram
Opener The Face of the Giants hits immediately with that unmistakable Leiser shuffle, a little organ line darting underneath before Cortazzi’s first wah-wah solo crashes in. Full Stop, already road-tested as a single, is built for the live room; a relentless riff, pounding drums, the kind of track that’ll go off hard in a tight venue like Kindred. Then Little Bit Further pulls a full gear change into something that sounds like a late-seventies roller disco. Glitter, fun, zero apologies.
The Melbourne show lands off the back of a massive 29-date international run through 2025, where the band spent the better part of a year road-testing new material across the globe. With three decades of touring, six studio albums, a pair of covers records and a stack of sought-after remixes behind them, Fun Lovin’ Criminals have earned their reputation as one of the most energetic live acts going around.
Expect fresh cuts from A Matter of Time alongside the classics; Scooby Snacks, which famously wove dialogue from Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs into one of the nineties’ most recognisable tracks, plus King of New York, Love Unlimited, Korean Bodega and Big Night Out.
Lyrically, the new album sits with themes of time and change; fitting for a band navigating a major lineup shift and a decade-and-a-half recording gap.
There’s melancholy in it, but liberation too. Leiser’s voice brings an intimacy that gives the songs a different kind of weight. For a band that built their world from rock, hip-hop, funk, blues, jazz and disco, A Matter of Time doesn’t abandon any of that history, it just expands it.
One night in Melbourne to catch all of it.
For more information, head here.
This article was made in partnership with Fun Lovin’ Criminals.
