Hot off the heels of the release of their latest album Future Ruins earlier this year, which saw them stamp their authority as the OG purveyors of widescreen psychedelic shoegaze, Swervedriver are ready to land back Down Under this September brandishing their latest long player full of molten riffs and a sonic roadtrip through the depths of their back catalogue stretching back almost 30 years.
SWERVEDRIVER AUSTRALIAN TOUR SEPTEMBER 2019
Thursday 19th September 2019 – Croxton Bandroom, Melbourne VIC
Friday 20th September 2019 – Manning Bar, Sydney NSW
Saturday 21st September 2019 – The Zoo, Brisbane QLD
Sunday 22nd September 2019 – Rosemount Hotel, Perth WA
Forming in Oxford in 1989, Swervedriver were thrown headlong into the forefront of UK underground music, soon signing to Alan McGee’s legendary Creation Records and releasing their seminal debut EP, Son of Mustang Ford in 1990. This began a prolific period of touring and releasing records, with albums Raise and Mezcal Head defining the heavier end of the shoegaze spectrum, and elevating them to the guitar pedal stomping pantheon inhabited by fellow luminaries such as Ride and Slowdive. Amidst personnel issues and management changes the core team of frontman Adam Franklin and fellow guitar arc welder Jimmy Hartridge maintained an astonishing work ethic that saw EPs, albums and tours completed at a prodigious rate until the band screeched to a halt at the end of 1998.
The eight year hiatus only saw the absence make the hearts of fans both old and new grow fonder as they returned triumphantly to the live scene at Coachella in 2008 followed by a number of US, UK and Australian tours. Firm favourites on Australian shores, Swervedriver last toured to ecstatic crowds three years ago in support of their first post-reformation album I Wasn’t Born To Lose You, with the wait now almost over for those looking to experience the spellbinding fuzzed out crackle and crunch of Future Ruins.
A product of its time, Future Ruins, doesn’t find the band settling in the middle age; rather it ventures from a bleak primal scream to a knowing introspection as they contemplate the modern dystopia we find ourselves mired in and kick out as only they know how – channelling simultaneous despair and resignation through coruscating yet tender walls of six string noise. Pack a set of earplugs and prepare for an epic night of sonic bliss.