Royal Headache

Another in an impressive string of Aussie bands, Royal Headache is from Sydney, not Melbourne, and while essentially a punk outfit, splices in some Northern Soul-ish DNA via singer Shogun.

My review ran yesterday at Blurt:

Royal Headache
Royal Headache
(What's Your Rupture?)

Royal Headache's debut begins in a pounding, pummeling riff-based rampage, all double-timed guitar strumming and frantic one-two drumming. "Never Again," the lead off track, runs as fast and hard and ragged as any punk anthem, taking the corners with two wheels off the ground. Yet fine as the band's all-out mayhem can be, that's not what sets this Aussie foursome apart. You see, Royal Headache is a punk band with a secret weapon, the sandpaper-y sweet, classic-rock-into-1960s soul vocals of Shogun, the singer whose raspy romanticism calls up memories of Jam-era Paul Weller, Ted Leo, Kevin Rowland of Dexy's Midnight Runners, even Rod Stewart in his rougher, earlier, Faces days.

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