Bleak art-rock royalty to play Golden Plains

FOLLOWING hard on the heels of shows in Canberra and Sydney, Bleak Squad are headed to Meredith to play Golden Plains Festival on 8 March.

Bleak Squad are a fairly new Melbourne four-piece comprised of Australian art-rock royalty and co-authors of some of the most critically acclaimed antipodean music of the last 40 years.

Featuring Mick Turner (Dirty Three, Mess Esque) Mick Harvey (Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, PJ Harvey, The Birthday Party), Adalita (Magic Dirt) and Marty Brown (Art of Fighting), “supergroup is an embarrassing word,” the band’s members insist.

“We looked at our calendars and there were only a few weeks we were all in the country and available, so we’ve jam-packed as many shows into them as we could because God knows when the next opportunity to play live together will happen again,” said Brown ahead of Golden Plains.

Their debut album Strange Love has been a roaring, out-of-left-field success in 2025, topping the AIR Chart, making a top 40 ARIA Chart debut, RRR and 3PBS Albums of the Week, and being shortlisted for The Australian Music Prize.

The nine songs percolate on brooding guitars, slippery basslines, organ drones, Brown’s lyrical drumming, and the unmistakable fizz of Turner’s guitar squawks.

Over it, Adalita and Harvey swap and share tales of love dampened, hope on hold and threaded tendrils of acceptance.

Their first live shows, including two shows at the Melbourne Recital Centre and a show in Sydney’s City Recital Hall with Ed Kuepper and Jim White, left audiences duly impressed and Meredith will wrap up a whirlwind national tour.

“The name Bleak Squad speaks to both this loose collection of misfits and the noirish mood of our music,” Adalita said.

“I just really love the album we’ve made. Playing with different musicians I’ve always looked up to and being so inspired by being in an actual new band, is really exciting. I really am pinching myself. It’s unreal. I really can’t wait to play live.”

Golden Plains Festival happens at the Meredith Supernatural Ampitheatre over 7-9 March.