Windwaker brought their Smile, You’re On Camera tour blow-out to Brisbane with The Pretty Wild, RinRin and Dregg for an absolute riot of a night. Four bands took the metal template and smashed it into their own distinctive soundscapes.

Ecca Vandal and 1300 served up fun, high-octane chaotic energy at The Brightside. The amount of joy, excitement and liveliness throughout the night was incredible as the crowd jumped, bounced and danced. It was real pun-rock!

How do you celebrate 31 years’ worth of rock hits in a few hours? Foo Fighters delivered a masterclass in how it’s done, bringing a concert experience full of celebratory energy to Brisbane with Full Flower Moon Band and Mini Skirt. Long live rock ‘n’ roll!

Something was in the air at Brisbane’s Fortitude Music Hall on Tuesday night, and it was metal. With lines stretching out the doors and moving quickly, a diverse crowd of metalheads of all ages gathered for a night of nostalgia, chaos and some seriously heavy music. With a stellar lineup featuring Australian metalcore outfit Heists, British heavyweights Sylosis and the legendary Killswitch Engage, Brisbane was in for a delicious musical treat.

What could easily have become a miserable, rain-soaked nightmare instead turned into a damp community music dream. Through relentless weather and muddy boots, ZED51 brought smiles, dancing, laughter and powerful performances to Roma Street Parkland, celebrating 4ZZZ and Brisbane’s wonderfully resilient music community.

Metal bros, metal babes, metal daddies, banana men, hotdog dudes and even Metal Mario gathered at Riverstage for a metal as fuck night.

TISM brought contradictory farce, golden and silver lamé suits, Russian folk dancing, feral yelling and crowd surfers who probably should have known better to Brisbane. Profound and profane, personal and political, their performances need to be seen and engaged with to be believed.

From Ashes To New promised Brisbane they’ll be back soon, but there might be one problem: next time, they’ll need a bigger venue. Their sold-out Triffid headline show brought rap, hip-hop, heavy metal and pop together with a crowd that was hungry to finally see them.

There were no elaborate distractions needed. Just talented musicians, beautifully written songs and an audience willing to give themselves completely to the experience as James filled Fortitude Music Hall with friendship, vulnerability and human connection, following an effortlessly cool opening set from Razorlight.

How fucking good is it to have Trivium and Lamb of God on the same bill? I last saw them at Knotfest in 2023 and 2024 respectively, so getting both together at Riverstage, with Bleed From Within opening, was something I was keen for. Brisbane was the final stop of the Australian tour, and I was back to catch all three.

August Burns Red returned to The Tivoli for the Brisbane stop of their Season Of Surrender tour. Their first Australian headline run in seven years brought I Promised The World, The Gloom In The Corner and Fallweather along for a night of metalcore and post hardcore.

Nouvelle Vague transformed The Tivoli into a chic French coffeehouse, breathing new life into beloved songs through hypnotic and intoxicating sonic soundscapes. It was a ‘cruisey’ set: relaxed and slightly sassy, and there should have been drinks with umbrellas in them.

The last gig of the tour, the gig blow-out and a homecoming. Violent Soho may have pointed out: “You guys weren’t all at Ric’s back in the day. We would have noticed.” But the huge crowd was there to celebrate Brisbane’s own, and one of Australia’s best alternative bands.

Imagine a classic ska sound blended with Frank Zappa, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Parliament-Funkadelic, Rage Against The Machine and Suicidal Tendencies, and you might get some idea of the magic Fishbone brought to The Triffid. Fishbone showed exactly why they’re considered serious contenders for the best live band on the planet.

Then Brother Ali arrived on the stage and somehow lifted the energy again. “Brisbane, are you in the house tonight? Did you come here to celebrate tonight?” Yes. Apparently, we fucking did. For a man who had just told us he had almost not been allowed into the country because of allegations surrounding the messages in his work, Brother Ali spent an extraordinary amount of his Brisbane show making people feel loved.

The dual headlining experience of Bush and Shinedown was not to be missed. It proved that rock still has power as the bands delivered the energy, the passion, the unmistakable voices that once blared through Australian radio and teenagers’ bedrooms in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

The kind of feral drop you feel hit your body before your eardrums have caught up with what the fuck just happened. Beauty, darkness and chaos followed as HEALTH completely let loose, with Duzsik eventually finishing the night with a crowd surf.

It is not often that you can say a band or musicians were better live than on recording, but with Lebanon Hanover you can. As a newbie to the world of the darkwave post-punk duo, I was unsure what to expect.

The Tanzneid Tour saved its biggest party for Brisbane. Electric Callboy, Ice Nine Kills and Coldrain delivered an end-of-tour blowout that had Riverstage bouncing from start to finish.

The Damned turned The Tivoli into a celebration of British punk, with a crowd reliving their youth and a band that showed no signs of slowing down.