King’s Justice Single launch

On Friday October 3 Perth’s Indie Rock scene legends hailing from Fremantle, KING’S JUSTICE, hosted their highly anticipated single launch at Ya-Ya’s in Northbridge. The new single ‘Darling’ comes after the release of KING’S JUSTICE’S four track EP, ‘To Your Arms I’d Run’ in March 2014. The night featured three other groups from all over WA.

The night kicked off with solo artist, heart breaker and music maker LUKE PALLIER, who needed nothing else but a microphone and a guitar to win over the people who were beginning to arrive at what was the beginning of a great night with good vibes. With a few original songs and a couple of covers Luke, whose voice can only be likened to that of an angel, set the bar pretty high for what was to come throughout the night.

Next up was BRAVES, another one of Perth’s best whose set included everything from slow songs with emotional and meaningful lyrical content, to catchy tunes that had the crowd bouncing like some sort of… crowd that bounces. BRAVES played brand new music from their five-track EP ‘Seapunk’ which is getting some good reviews as well. The band also featured Hogwarts’ own HP playing on his massive Viola Bass with a drummer who is too hardcore for his own good.

The final posse to play before the men of the hour(s) was six-piece band LATE NIGHT HYSTERICS who had the largest array of gear I’d ever seen for any kind of band. There set-up featured a synthesizer (or two), two keyboards, drums, a crap-ton of guitars, and ass-ton of microphones. It became evident throughout the night that if you weren’t multitasking on stage, you weren’t getting laid after the show.

When the clock struck 10:30 (way past the bed-time of the average 20-year-old) it was time for KING’S JUSTICE, the band everyone had come to see finally release their new single, ‘Darling’, which had only been played live a few times before.

The four-piece is band made up of four very talented duderino’s. Jack Young, lead vocals and guitarist had a tough job plucking away at the strings while singing, but was able to do so without fail. Jack is described by some industry professionals, as the Mariah Carey of his generation.

On back-up vocals and drums we saw Matt Ryder, laying down some phat-beats on the custom designed KING’S JUSTICE drum-kit. The word around the room at Ya-Ya’s was that Matt Ryder is a sick dude, and he showed us just how sick he was, so sick, you could say he is the influenza of his generation.

Slappin’ the bass for KJ was Declan Sinnott, the quickest fingers in the game so ladies, please form a line. The bass-line for the KING’S JUSTICE sound is essential and Declan does a great job never missing a beat.

On the Keyboard, Keytar and back-up vocals was Tim Arnott, who kept his cool when multitasking for the entirety of the set kept everything in-check in centre stage.

This highly anticipated new song was something completely different to any other sound from KJ. From the unique drumbeat to the sexy riffs that had me whistling the entire next-day, everything about this tune was beautiful.

Let me break it down for you. The new five-minute track will take you on a rollercoaster ride of emotions and will induce those happy thoughts. It starts fairly slow and mellow with the bass-line you’ll be humming all night, then in come the drums, followed by guitar and vocals, one after the other. The song then moves to a happy fast-paced tune. Just as the song reaches the peak of energy, it comes back down like some sort of high, and just when you think it’s over, they squeezed in one final section to end on a soft note just as it started, to bring some closure to the song.

I like to think that this new sound is what we can expect from KING’S JUSTICE in the future as well as staying true to their catchy upbeat songs as well.

The originality and creativity of all the bands was downright amazing. Sometimes, with a lot of other music genres, there are often a lot of generic sounding music; bands playing similar music to other bands, taking some techniques from other successful artists. However all of the sounds that came from each of the bands was completely original, and was very impressive, not at all what I had expected from a local gig.

Personally, I am fairly used to going to local heavy metal/hard-core/whateverthefuckyoucallit gigs where you throw down, get sweaty and punch the air, so it was nice to just stand there and listen. With that kind of music there is only so much originality you can fit into a song without drawing inspiration from other musicians. It really takes something special to do something special and all of these bands brought a lot of something special.

Lachlan Rodenburg