Aussie Icons Amyl and the Sniffers Transcend on Cartoon Darkness
The four-piece Aussie rock band show off their versatile songwriting on the highly-anticipated third album.
Eight years since four mates formed Amyl and The Sniffers in the bayside Melbourne suburb of St. Kilda, home to rowdy backpackers and penguins, they continue to surprise and satisfy both in the studio and on stage. The Australian group’s third album Cartoon Darkness kicks into high gear with growling distortion, torn asunder with some snarling riffage on opener “Jerkin’.” Vocalist Amy Taylor is out for blood. Her prey are keyboard warriors, jealous music industry insiders and the men who ogle her skimpy costumes then lambast her for her bold outfits. Taylor’s voice is so versatile: from a bratty sing-song on “Tiny Bikini” to a Chrissy Amphlett-style husky snarl, or her really lovely, pared-back melodic vocals on “Big Dreams.”
Cartoon Darkness is the perfect combination of Amyl and The Sniffers’ signature garage punk sound with ventures into poppier, more introspective terrain. Like one and a half minutes of a sonic jackhammer going wild, “It’s Mine” exemplifies the band’s ability to channel the savage, bristling thrill of a young Ozzy Osbourne. Their second album, Comfort To Me (2021), gave Taylor a platform to voice her battle with an emotional rollercoaster, fighting the negativity of being isolated as both the sole woman in many rooms and as a result of stringent lockdowns in Melbourne during the pandemic. She remains blessedly unafraid to voice her personal and political views without polishing them up for easy digestion. “We’re all pigs after all!” she hollers on the aptly titled “Pigs.” Accompanied by a noodling, headbanging solo from guitarist Declan (Dec) Mehrtens and a malevolent bassline courtesy of Gus Romer, it’s full catharsis in barely two and a half minutes.
The standout track, in this Melbourne-born and based reviewer’s humble opinion—and at least 5.6 million Spotify listeners and radio stations worldwide—is the strutting, throbbing anthem “U Should Not Be Doing That.” Taylor aims her vitriol directly at a handful of Australian states and the myopic little men snitching about her costumes, her attitude and her inappropriateness online. The final verse pays homage to the Indigenous names of Australian states while Taylor lacerates her bullies: “I was in Naarm, working on my shit, while you were down in Tassie saying ‘Flash those tits!’ I was in Gadigal showing off my flex, while you were up in Brissie tryna tell me I can’t do it like that.” There’s an energetic bounce that propels the track along, in the spirit of Divinyls’ 1985 classic “Pleasure & Pain” or Midnight Oil’s 1982 hit “Power and the Passion.”
Still dripping in sweat from high-octane performances at Primavera, Glastonbury, Coachella, Green Man, Osheaga, Outside Lands, Best Keep Secret and All Points East, Amyl and the Sniffers headed into the Foo Fighters’ 606 Studios in Los Angeles with acclaimed British producer Nick Launay (Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Anna Calvi, Idles, Nick Cave) who has done a stunning job on the Peaky Blinders soundtracks. It is a credit to Launay that this album sounds wholly Amyl without the distraction of a heavy-handed producer.
For Taylor’s fiercely loyal femme fanbase, “Tiny Bikini” and “Me and the Girls” reassert our right to wear what we want, say what we want, how and whenever we want. Taylor’s lines hit hard, but she delivers them with a lightness of spirit, leaving listeners to wonder if they’re in on the joke, or the butt of it: “Me and the girls just want free abortions, you and the boys can’t even get waxed.”
While the world might be hailing Charli XCX and Kamala as “brat,” perhaps the ultimate undeclared brat is Queen of Tiny Bikinis and Australian Rock, Amy Taylor.
Read our interview with Amyl and the Sniffers here.