Kirin J Callinan
Howl & Moan Records, Shop 4/103 Jonson St, 2481 Byron Bay Directions
Thu 30.07.2026 19:00
Worse Records, The AFP & The ATO & Select Music presents…
THE SQUEEKI WHEEL (GETS THE GREASE)
The last and only great Rock & Roll act conducting psychic operations in the world today, ESCAPE-ISM join Australia’s most singular voice Kirin J Callinan, live in concert for the first & only time ever in Australia. Fronted by the legendary Washington DC Author, Filmaker, Dilettante and Rock & Roll philosopher provocateur Ian Svenonius and Los Angeles Multi-Instrumentalist, Choreographer and icon Sandi Denton, ESCAPE-ISM join KIRIN J for what will be historical East Coast shows.
Plus Sydney’s worst ROOM FULL OF PUSSY; Brisbane’s Best ARTHINGTON STACK; and Melbourne’s premiere smack-wave
Maestro SPIKE FUCK join for select shows, with KIDSKIN, SZEM & LIVESTOCK also in tow for Sydney’s CHATEAU WAH WAH show.
Performers
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Kirin J Callinan
Kieran John Callinan, known by his stage name Kirin J. Callinan, is an Australian singer, songwriter, and guitarist. He is also a founding member of Mercy Arms and has played with the Night Game, Jack Ladder and the Dreamlanders, Mark Ronson and Genesis Owusu. Referred to as the enfant terrible of Australia's underground rock music scene, Callinan is known for his flamboyant public persona, confrontational live shows, and diverse musical output in which, according to Spin, "the distinctions between talent, irony, and genuine bad taste bleed together until they're indistinguishable." Callinan said that his primary motivation as a musician is to "excite and confuse,... But you can't do that for any length of time without having sincerity."
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Spike Fuck
Spike Fuck is a rare figure in contemporary music — direct, disarming, and impossible to pin down. Emerging from Melbourne’s underground in the late 2010s with The Smackwave EP, Spike fused bleak synth-pop, post-punk melodrama, and brutally honest songwriting into something both vulnerable and confrontational. Armed with only a backing track and a microphone, early live shows saw Spike sing candidly about addiction, gender, dysfunctional love, and collapse — a kind of wounded sincerity that quickly drew a cult following.
That early wave brought unexpected momentum: international tours, modelling for Rick Owens, and eventually a signing with Partisan Records. But just as things seemed to be breaking open, Spike disappeared, retreating from public life amid a personal reckoning.
After a three-year hiatus -- during which time rumours swirled about death, institutions, or becoming a monk -- Spike returned in 2024: sober, clear-eyed, and transformed. The music that followed is bigger, wilder, and more alive. Performed with a rotating full band, the new material draws from ‘70s glam, spiritual soul, and damaged rock and roll — but always filtered through Spike’s unmistakable voice: bruised, intense, poetic.
These are songs about recovery, identity, survival, and letting go — not sanitised, not triumphant, but real. Where the early work stared into the void, the new work steps forward with purpose. It’s not a reinvention. It’s an evolution — one born from chaos, now grounded in clarity.
