Coldwave

Previous praise for Coldwave:

“Whether they’re keeping the neighbours awake at local venues, or tearing it up on huge festival stages, it’s Coldwave's humility, passion and community-oriented identity that continue to underpin their success.” triple j Unearthed [Feature Artist]

“This is the musical equivalent of that mysterious new kid at your school you wanna sidle up to and know everything about.” Abby Butler, triple j

“a distorted post-punk fist to the face” The Note

“precise in [its] chaos” Laundry Echo

Already starting to create buzz for themselves in Australia, Coldwave share their first release for 2024, ‘The Ants’ with B-Side ‘Italia '06’ via P.A.K. Records, both produced and recorded by Bonnie Knight (2024 AIR Independent Producer of the Year – Amyl & The Sniffers, Angie McMahon, ENOLA) and mixed by James Trevascus (Nick Cave & Warren Ellis, Billy Nomates, RVG).

‘The Ants’ is a frantic yet tightly controlled blend of jagged guitars, booming horns and uncompromising vocal delivery, where Coldwave capture the abstract in life’s most mundane moments. It’s tightly coiled and unwinds itself like an emo-tinged prequel to their 2021 single ‘Plagiarise’, with expansively layered bars peppered throughout. “We returned to a really comfortable place writing this song,” says vocalist Harrison Evans. “It’s built around reminiscing on childhood, and is a bit of a soul-searching expedition around the realisation that you’re one of many”.

On ‘Italia '06’ they open the song playing with negative space and spoken word, before the aural spike strip is laid down and explodes in the second half. It’s the more narrative-driven song of the two and references the classic ‘Aussie battler’ trope - “someone who feels hard done by in a social or cultural bubble where life is actually pretty good” - through the lens of a penalty wrongly awarded to Italy during the 2006 World Cup, or, a moment that ‘broke Australia’.

Following the release of their debut EP Same Window, Different House in 2023, Coldwave were named triple j Unearthed Feature Artist, performed at Laneway Festival amongst a stacked lineup including Turnstile and Fontaines D.C., and made their much-talked-about debut at Bigsound 2023, with Dave Ruby Howe (triple j) applauding the band for “delivering heavily to a big room which seemed to have caught wind that something was cooking... every member of the band vying for your eyes with intense noodling, rumbling rhythm section and demonic trumpet.”

Coldwave - Harrison Evans (he/him; vocals), Kiran Memisoglou (he/him; guitar) Anthony Griffin (he/him; guitar/vocals), Sean McGowan (they/them; trumpet/synth/vocals), Lara Patzel (she/they; bass) and Jordan Maywald (he/him; drums) - formed in 2020 and have continued to evolve rapidly, welcoming new collaborators, exploring experimental instrumentation, and building a national audience, while remaining steadfastly loyal to their home community. They have released two EPs No Conflict (2023), Same Window, Different House (2023) and have performed with Citizen, Pond, RVG and more.