Australian band dust release Sky Is Falling on October 10^th through Kanine Records.

Accents are odd things in music. Some singers lose all trace of their accent when they sing, others are instantly recognisable due to embracing theirs. The Australian pub-rock scene is in rude health right now and many of its exponents lean heavily into their Australian twang. Amyl and the Sniffers and The Chats to name but two. With Dust though, you would struggle to place either Justin Teale or Gabe Stove as Australian. Without reading any of the blurb that accompanies them you would probably guess they were a Northern English band.

There are some extremely big reference points in their sound encompassing an array of indie icons. There is more than a hint of Fontaines D.C. about them in their style of vocal delivery. At other points, musically, Joy Division are more to the fore. They are convincingly a cohesive whole of their own though. Whilst opening track ‘Drawbacks’ makes you think of a range of mid-noughties indie the thoroughly now use of saxophone over the top gives it a style all of its own. It is a thrilling and dynamic opener. ‘Just Like Ice’ reinforces the use of slightly offbeat guitar with a great call and response back and forth between the two vocalists.

Single ‘Alistair’ brings melody more to the fore in a high-quality track. ‘Two Dogs’ has the saxophone front and centre. ‘Swamped’ is a punkier effort with the drumming reaching frenetic levels. There is a real instrumental control on display here.

‘Fairy’ is the track that could most easily have sat upon Romance, that you could imagine their work on an album that great speaks volumes about the quality on display on this debut album.

‘Day Tight’ takes a couple of minutes to get going but thrills when it finally does. Final track ‘In Reverie’ slows everything down a bit, showing another string to their bow. Only in the spoken word section at the end is the evidence of an Australian accent finally there.

This is an exceptionally solid debut album, a band that have absorbed a range of strong influences but ended with style all of their own. Everything suggests they are likely a formidable live band with an exceptional drummer. This will highly appeal to fans of Fontaines DC, mid-noughties indie and post-punk. It is a dynamic album and very much a point of cultural difference to the majority of good music coming out of Australia right now.