A gang of teenagers make music that owes a lot to adolescence, but never feels juvenile or simplistic.
For most of us, our teenage years were filled with awkward and uncomfortable days as we tried to find our place in the world. The Goon Sax, a Brisbane trio made up of 17- and 18-year-olds, present those days in all their frenzied glory on their debut release Up To Anything. Here, teen melodrama melds beautifully with shoegaze pop music, amplifying the messages of wanting to blend in, stand out, and fade away all at the same time.
The band members’ youth – a factor that most would take to mean inexperience – is used to their benefit. Who else but teenagers are more qualified to sing about the misery of trying to get others to like you when you’re not sure you do yourself? Songs like ‘Home Haircuts’ and ‘Boyfriend’ cover thematic material that swings from the emotionally overdramatic to the painfully dull, while ‘Sweaty Hands’ captures the shared embarrassments we take for personal failures.
Up To Anything is a snapshot of those teenage days when we interpret our awkwardness as a fault, not yet recognising it as that which makes us unique. This makes the music both personal, relatable, and wonderfully sincere. This is a brilliant debut filled with teenage bravado and a talent belying the band’s years.
BY DANIEL PRIOR
