If the work of These New South Whales had to be boiled down to one singular thing, it’s an unwavering preoccupation with the power of truth. Whether it be picking the brains of a fellow muso on their podcast, playing heightened versions of themselves on their Comedy Central TV show or, of course, making music that knocks the wax right out of your eardrums, you’ll find truth at its core.

The Melbourne/Naarm punk four-piece – Jamie Timony (vocals), Todd Andrews (guitar), Will Shepherd (bass) and Frank Sweet (drums) – have always had a habit of standing up to power; an anti-authority edge has run deep in their music from the start. But their latest album, the full-throttle GODSPEED, may be their most purpose-driven project yet. “I always return to themes like that,” Jamie says. “It’s a theme that just runs in us as people and music is a really great way to express that. So often you feel like you don’t have much power to do anything about anything. Music is the one space where you can really let that energy go.”

The majority of GODSPEED was cooked up over a fruitful few days in a nook of Victoria’s picturesque Otways. “It was four days of just hanging around, cooking together, drinking wine, chilling, going for a little walk through the rainforest,” Jamie says. “It was so fun because we got to leave all of our other responsibilities behind and just literally focus on being creative.” 

“A lot of stuff came out just from that session,” Todd adds. “I think it’s where we solidified what the group of songs would be for the album and what we needed to add or what was missing. The exciting part was just locking in and working on some stuff we already had in the camp, but then also just seeing what came out.”

What came out was 11 songs of cross-genre experimentation. Cascading between twinges of Britpop, pockets of punk and the signature hints of hardcore that These New South Whales have become known for, GODSPEED is a manifest of the times. As a body of work that speaks to the value of humanity in the push against power, it’s an album that could have only been made in this moment of political upheave and worldly distress. But, as Todd points out, it’s also an album that could have only been made with their previous ones in the bag: You Work for Us (2017), I Just Do What God Tells Me to Do (2019) and TNSW (2022).

“When we were making TNSW, we hadn’t explored all of that yet,” Todd says, referring to the shift in sincerity between their second and third albums. “We were more confident in that this time around, having done that already and it working.” Jamie adds that the process of making TNSW and GODSPEED were pretty much identical. “It worked last time not to overthink it or be too prescriptive, and so we just kind of did the same thing this time.”

The choice to not overthink the music has culminated in a collection of tunes that lays bare personal stories of hurt, healing and hope. But when you mix those three things together, what do you get? A title track of cathartic joy, detailing Jamie’s experience of leaving Alcoholics Anonymous after nine years. “At some point I just woke up and realised that it’s all kind of based on nonsense,” he reflects. “I’m not denying that drinking problems exist – they definitely do – but, you know, the way AA frames them is not something I agree with anymore.

“It was a slow thawing-out process, but I kind of realised that recovery is possible outside of that lifelong program. It leaves a bit of a scar, and it’s difficult – what you find is when you come out of there, you haven’t actually done any work on your relationship with substances at all. You’ve just been telling yourself, ‘I have a disease and God will fix it if I pray every morning.’ And so when you come out, you’re like, ‘Oh, I actually need to work on this.’ It’s been a work in progress ever since. ‘GODSPEED’ touches on that euphoria of taking back your own agency.”

While “GODSPEED” recounts the elation that Jamie experienced after closing that particular chapter of his life, many people could feel like they’re the protagonist of its story. Right across the album, personal histories are stand-ins for whatever the listener makes of them – These New South Whales have a knack for making the personal feel universal.

In more ways than one, the personal has become even more universal thanks to the band’s beloved podcast. What A Great Punk, hosted by Jamie and Todd, features chats with a slew of musicians and creative folk, and has recently (sadly) announced a break from usual programming after five years of chinwagging. “We’ve certainly been very open-book about our personal lives and opinions,” Jamie laughs. “Maybe sometimes even to a fault.” 

A highlight of that, Todd says, is that punters and podcast-listeners are unafraid to come up to the band at gigs and say hi, reflecting the same sense of community that they work into their shows. “We prefer to be right in there with the crowd and connect with them,” he says. “If we give our sets a lot of energy, then that is always reciprocated by the audience. It’s a really nice feeling of coming together.”

This interview comes straight from the pages of issue 129. To get your mitts on a copy, swing past the frankie shop, subscribe or visit one of our lovely stockists.