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By The Barman

The Barman

27 August 2026

Hits: 1145

• hitmen
• new christs
• radio birdman
• screaming tribesmen
• australian tour
• chris klondike masuak
• chris masuak's dog solider
• 2026

A year after a freak emergency eye incident in his adopted home of Spain led to the cancelation of an Australian tour, Chris Klondike Masuak is back for selected dates up and down the East Coast. Tickets for all shows go on sale at 0800 (AEST) on August 28.

“The Shiny Side Tour” takes in three states and the ACT in a run that the former Radio Birdman, Hitmen, New Christs, and Screaming Tribesmen guitarist says is “both unfinished business and an obligation”.

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By The Barman

The Barman

21 August 2026

Hits: 491

• dunhill blues
• 20 years

Twenty years, six albums, two European tours and almost an entire Australian continent later, Sydney's The Dunhill Blues are still getting in the van.

In 2006, Dan Dunhill was 29-years-old, writing songs on guitar while bouncing his baby boy to sleep in a little chair with his foot. He’d written 10 of them. He’d never played guitar in a band before. He’d never been the singer in a band before, either. But he reckoned he could probably handle it.

The ambitions were fairly modest: make a proper album, rather than another shitty four-song demo, and get out of Sydney to play somewhere else. Dan hadn’t even been to Melbourne at that point.

There was never a grand plan to get famous. There wasn’t much expectation of being popular, either. And perhaps that’s part of the reason The Dunhill Blues are still here.

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By The Barman

The Barman

13 August 2026

Hits: 648

• australian tour
• thje damned
• uk tour
• live at club 76

Five decades on from “(I’m) Stranded”, The Saints ’73-’78 have announced a summer Australian tour and the release of an unearthed live 1976 Saints recording.

The Saints ’73-’78 will hit the road in Australia in January and February 2027 after November-December UK shows with The Damned as part of the latter’s worldwide Final Damnation 50th anniversary tour. Tickets for the Aussie run go on sale on August 14 here. 

Those Australian shows will accompanied by the  release of "Live At Club 76", featuring the original Saints and  recorded in September 1976 at the band’s famed Petrie Terrace, Brisbane, rehearsal space and ad-hoc venue. 

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By The Barman

The Barman

03 August 2026

Hits: 711

• lyres
• dmz
• jeff connolly
• obituary
• mono-men

They never rose to household name status but Jeff “Mono Man” Conolly’s bands DMZ and Lyres left an indelible mark on (to use the term he hated) “garage rock”. Conolly died at his Massachusetts home last Friday after a struggle with bladder cancer, aged 69

Raised in Connecticut, Conolly moved to Boston in the mid 1970s and fronted DMZ from 1976, mixing British Invasion melody and punk rock’s urgency with obscure ‘60s garage music.

DMZ attracted the attention of Seymour Stein's legendary Sire Records, joining a roster that included the Ramones, Talking Heads and the Flamin' Groovies before releasing their sole album in 1978 and then breaking up.

With Lyres, the band he formed in 1979, Connolly built that obsession into a distinctive sound driven by Vox Continental organ, reverb-soaked guitars, pounding rhythms and impassioned vocals.

Despite being active for decades, Lyres released only four studio albums. Their reputation rests more on their electrifying live performances, influential singles and EPs, and the enduring impact of their classic debut “On Fyre”. They are all required listening, as is the box set seven-inch compilation on Munster Records, "Lucky 7", from where the obituary photo comes. 

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By The Barman

The Barman

28 July 2026

Hits: 582

• ian rilen
• cathy green
• laughing clowns
• vanilla chainsaws
• waxworks
• spirits of the hoey
• hopetoun hotel
• vrag
• lo carmen
• box the jesuit

You’ve seen the “Spirits of the Hoey” book, the tribute to Sydney’s iconic Hopetoun Hotel by academics Liz Guiffre and Gregory Ferris, with the photographs of Bryan “Cookie” Cook. Now you can experience the live gig when Petersham Bowling Club hosts “Spirits of The Hoey – A Live Love Letter To The Hopetoun Hotel” on Saturday October 31.

Tickets are expected to sell out long before the event and are on sale here. 

Heading the bill is a reformation of Vrag, the band that would morph into Machine Gun Fellatio, with very special guest Christa Hughes on vocals.

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By The Barman

The Barman

28 July 2026

Hits: 578

• sydney
• moshpit bar
• closure
• live music

_{Venue supplied image.}

Sydney’s live music scene has suffered another body blow with the news that small bar MoshPit will close its doors in November. In its ninth year and at the end of its lease, the venue’s majority owner Pat Jones delivered the sad news via social media late yesterday,

A nursery for up-and-coming bands and a home to veteran acts alike, the room has hosted thousands of musicians down the years, weathering Covid, a sagging economy, red tape and ever-shifting demographics.

The venue took on lockdowns head-on, staging limited capacity streamed events including Monday Evening Gunk, a tonight show-style venture with The I-94 Bar that spanned two seasons.  Co-founder Jill Dures was a driving force in that and MoshPit’s early years.

An institution on King Street in the inner-western suburb of St Peters, tThe ongoing gentrification of the area has forced the owners' hands.  

Despite an awkward lay-out that sometimes tested capacity and patron comfort, MoshPit was the CBGB of Sydney where untested acts could have a go. MoshPit’s closure will leave a yawning gap at the small end of the live music market that Sydney will struggle to fill.