Words by: Sam Walker-Smart
We all need an adrenaline kick after the holidays. The lack of sunlight, overindulgence in food, and losing track of the days can take a toll on anyone. Luckily, Australia’s Delivery is here to kick off 2025 with a bang. Just two weeks into the new year, the Melbourne-based garage punks are back with their sophomore effort, Force Majeure. Distributed through their new label, Heavenly Records, the album is a kinetic party time record that screams “summer.” This makes sense, considering that Down Under’s seasons are the reverse of the Northern Hemisphere. From the opening blast of “Digging The Hole,” it’s clear that the quintet is leaving subtlety at the door.
With a guitar tone that would make Gang of Four proud and a groovy indifference akin to Parquet Courts, Delivery has a brutish sound that carries plenty of indie charm. This is especially apparent on the track “Like A Million Bucks,” where bassist Rebecca Allan takes the lead vocals, adding a welcome contrast to James Lynch’s bar rocker tones. Like any great punk band, Delivery doesn’t waste time on grand ballads and songs of longing. Instead, they cast a cynical eye on the madness and monotony of everyday life.
While their fellow countrymen Amyl and The Sniffers gleefully raise two fingers to the patriarchy, Delivery takes a different approach. They’ve captured the exhaustion and apathy that the modern world breeds. “Stuck In The Game” features Allan dispassionately reeling off competing memories and repeating cycles. Meanwhile, drums and frenzied guitar solos battle it out in the background. It’s the audio equivalent of being stuck in a storm and simply not giving a shit anymore. The following track, “The New Alphabet” shifts the pace, with the band embracing a Television-inspired melody, smartly adding a brief reprieve midway through the album’s runtime.
The break is short-lived, though. On “Deadlines,” the band takes on the soul-crushing effects of office life and the all-too-familiar habit of living for the weekend. While these themes may sound depressing, Delivery turns them into headbanging stompers that clock in at a concise three minutes. An interesting glimpse into the outfit’s future comes with the synth-driven “What Else?”, an infectiously droll New Wave number. Backed by a drum machine and suitably 80s bassline, Delivery surprisingly fit a song about losing faith and patience into their chaotic yet infectious sound.
With Force Majeure, these Aussie noise merchants have taken what worked on their debut, Forever Giving Handshakes, and added some spit and polish—and that’s no bad thing in my book. For many outside of the trendsetters, this will be their first introduction to the band’s brand of singular garage rock. There’s enough social commentary and musical ambition to make their songs worth revisiting while still keeping things raw enough to kickstart your day. No country does it better when it comes to thrashing riffs, hilarious lyrics, and invoking a sense of beer-soaked bars. Delivery are the latest Melbournites to grab you by your collar and shake some fun into you. This is the perfect remedy for those winter blues—wherever you are.