Melbourne punk metal outfit Knight Rider will launch their debut EP Straight To Tape at The Old Bar this month.
Recorded in one raw take at a JMC studio, the three-track release captures everything that makes Knight Rider worth paying attention to. No edits, no overdubs, no digital safety net; just three songs laid down exactly as they happened in the room.
Straight To Tape isn’t trying to be perfect. It’s trying to be honest. Frontman Kit Werren leads the charge with old school metal sensibility, backed by Tom Bradshaw on guitar, Finn Smith on bass and George Costello on drums.
Together they’ve built something that hits hard without needing studio trickery to land. Mixed and mastered by Alex Vella from Dead Ed, these tracks were handpicked to show exactly what Knight Rider are about: grit, energy and zero compromise.
Knight Rider EP launch
- Where: The Old Bar, Fitzroy
- When: Friday 13 February
- Tickets: here
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Knight Rider will close out the night alongside Paper St and Penalty in what’s shaping up to be a properly stacked local punk lineup. Friday the 13th feels like the right date for a band this committed to doing things their own way.
Recording the EP live in a single take wasn’t just a creative choice, it was a statement of intent. Knight Rider wanted to bottle the feeling of being in the room with them, sweat and volume and all. The JMC studio they used carries its own mythology too, with long-running rumours that AC/DC once tore through the same space. Whether that’s true or not hardly matters; the room’s got history in its walls, and Straight To Tape taps into it.
This is a band that exists for people who want their punk metal served without any gloss. Weight over production. Riffs over refinement. Attitude baked into every second. Knight Rider aren’t reinventing anything, and they’re not trying to. They’re just doing it properly.
Lead single Messed Up digs into the messy reality of being an artist; the push and pull between ambition and self-preservation, the tension between chasing what you love and knowing when to step back. It’s a snapshot of internal conflict wrapped in riffs that refuse to let up. The track sets the tone for an EP that trades polish for presence and comes out stronger for it.
For more information, head here.
