A newly minted psych-punk garage band based in Naarm/ Melbourne, Milksick come at you with a frenetic pace that is all-consuming.
After first jamming together in 2022 before making their live debut in January this year, Milksick have spent the rest of the year consistently gigging throughout the city.The five-piece – Sam Birkhead (vox), Young Ha Kim (guitar), Darcy Eddy (guitar), Simon Lowther (bass) and Brae Nicholls (drums) – have supported the likes of The Maggie Pills, Batpiss, Black Bats and Pet Therapy along the way.
Now they're taking the covers off their very first single release, 'Midas', which was entirely self-recorded using their regular rehearsal space as well as band member homes, with Darcy as the recording engineer.
Crunchy, abrasive, punk-rock riffs and pounding, wild drumming come blaring at you, with vocals that are diluted, blunted, almost washed-out – which adds to the song's anarchy.
It's a chaotic mess of nitrogen-fuelled rock & roll – detailing scam emails, phone calls and texts – that'll leave you lightheaded after you bounce around like a rabid rabbit for the track's two-minute journey.
With the song released today, scenestr is pumped to premiere the music video for 'Midas' today. Enjoy.
"'Midas' came out of an experience I had a little while ago, where I received a super put-together call from someone claiming to be the ATO," shares Sam.
"It came at just the right time because I was waiting on my tax return to be processed and I knew I'd owe the government a bit of money. They started gunning for aloooooot of money, and I mean a lot.
"They had my personal details and it all felt so real until they started trying to get me to pay over the phone, that's when I sort of went 'ah yep, I'm being scammed'.
"It's crazy how cunning a lot of these scams are nowadays; I remember being able to easily identify scam calls near straight away, but it seems like that's getting harder and harder to do since COVID and the rise of scam phone calls, texts and emails."
A DIY band, the 'Midas' music Video was made by their close friend Llama Lab. "The music video for 'Midas' came out of this idea of the distorted perception of reality that scammers create in their victims," Darcy says.
"We've been close mates with Llama Lab for awhile and thought his retro, glitchy, psyched-out projections would be a perfect vessel to expand on the concept.
"In the end, Llama Lab pumped out this uncomfortable, chaotic, retro cult trip of a music video that we couldn't be happier with!"
The choice of recording space did add to the song's grittiness, but it wasn't without some hassles getting the right 'take'. "The recording setup for 'Midas' was pretty hodge-podge in the best way possible," Darcy says.
"We recorded drums and vocals at our regular rehearsal space in Brunswick and had to try and time our takes between the doom metal band's blast beats next door.
"Can't tell you how many takes we had to discard because of a closing door, someone yelling in the hallway, or just relentless bass drum doofs coming through the mics. That's what we get for recording in a rehearsal studio I guess hahaha."
