Words and Photos Alec Smart

British alt-rock powerhouse Don Broco performed at Princess Theatre in Woolloongabba, Brisbane, to a receptive, enthusiastic audience on the opening night of their 2025 Australian tour. They were supported by Sydney pop-punkers RedHook and Melbourne metallers Future Static.

Future Static opened the concert with a tsunami of energy, and as a crowd-warmer, they set the thermostat high. Onstage they moved continuously, which soon animates the enthusiastic crowd.

Formed in 2020, this six-piece, female-fronted band hail from Melbourne and their bright star continues to rise meteorically.

Singer Aramiah Cook has a dynamic vocal range, alternating between melodic singing and harsh growls. With her commanding stage presence, she paces, glares, and bares her teeth like a lioness defending her pride. She’s accompanied on vocals by bassist Kira Nell, who has a pleasant singing voice, and between them, they lift the progressive metal riffs of the driving guitars and drums to a level of sublime.

Aramiah, who was raised in Barcelona, Spain, and replaced original vocalist Brianna Marsh in 2021. She debuted on the band’s single Waves, which was declared Featured Artist of The Week on both Radio Triple J Unearthed as well as Britain’s Kerrang! Radio and significantly raised the profile of the band – leading to a European tour and numerous accolades.

Future Static have released two mini-albums, Want (2018) and Fatalist (2020), as well as a cover of Gasolina, the 2004 hit by Puerto Rican rapper Daddy Yankee, sung in its original Spanish.

Their debut album, Liminality (2023), is a scorcher, and before you check your dictionaries for the definition of the word ‘liminality’, it’s defined as: “a state or quality of being in an in-between or transitional phase, a ‘threshold’ between one stage of life, identity, or social structure and another.”

RedHook need little introduction. This band have gone from strength to strength since they torpedoed their way into the Australian music scene in 2017, with compelling live concerts and genre-defying music that draws elements from metal, punk, glam, pop, electronica and rap.

On stage at Brisbane’s Princess Theatre, the band tripped the switch with Bomb.com, as the human firework Emmy Mack, their enigmatic frontwoman, sauntered to the front wearing a black puffer jacket and dark sunglasses.

With the collar pulled up to hide her long scarlet tresses, she resembled a film star popping out of her house on a Sunday morning, hoping to purchase a pint of milk without predatory paparazzi photographers recognising her.

RedHook then performed their new single, Dr. Frankenstein, the music video of which was filmed in a video game arcade (watch here). Emmy ditched the sunglasses then flung off her jacket to reveal a mauve, skin-tight, cropped rubber top.

An assistant scurried onstage to deposit three small boxes at the front behind the foldback monitors, which looked like small sandwich containers for a picnic. After Emmy announced their song Hot Tub, the mini boxes began churning out a mass of foam bubbles. The effusion of drifting spheres, which glowed under the stage lighting, resembled a sparkling forest of orbs from a pixy dell.

While the music played, Emmy mischievously encouraged bubbles to land on her extended tongue.

The band continued performing highlights from their collection of singles and two albums Mutation (2024) and Postcard From A Living Hell (2023). During their fourth song, Hexxx, Emmy invited Future Static singer Aramiah to join her onstage, and the two traded vocals whilst dropping to their knees.

Emmy identified a fan in the crowd named Joel who’d earlier requested they play Off With Your Head, and he was identified in the throng and handed a microphone to join them in singing the chorus.

Bassist Ned Jankovic then called for a circle-dance and the moshpit duly obliged and surged clockwise.

Guitarist Craig Wilkinson substituted guitar for saxophone on several songs (including the night’s extended finale, Bad Decisions).

During a short break late in their set, Emmy rushed backstage to change into a mock straitjacket, the kind worn by severely restrained mental patients, with a face mask resembling that worn by Doctor Hannibal Lecter in thriller movie Silence Of The Lambs. The band then performed their horror-rock song Psych Vs Psych.

Emmy changed again into a white dress with bloodlike red streaks down the front, then berated herself publicly, declaring, “Who’s stupid idea was it to have two costume changes, one after the other?!”

During the following number, Dead Walk, Emmy lay motionless on her back (one of her signature moves), and in the red-stained dress she resembled a warrior slain in battle.

For the band’s finale, their hit song Bad Decisions, Emmy requested a ‘wall of death’. For those unfamiliar, during a wall of death the crowd parts in two, the respective sides then turn and face each other, and after a command, each side runs and collides with their opposites.

Emmy stressed it had to be respectful (ie, resulting in no injuries), instructing, “We want a wholesome wall of death!”

Members of Future Static then ran onstage clasping inflatable beach balls, which they booted out into the surging crowd. Soon there were multi-coloured balls bouncing back and forth between hundreds of outstretched fingertips as the band finished their energetic set.

Aside from the Don Broco Australian tour RedHook spent most of April - May 2025 in Europe on their first headlining tour, and are about to embark on another UK + European tour supporting As December Falls.

During the break, assistants placed three sturdy platforms at the stage front (for band members to elevate themselves).

British alt-rockers Don Broco then took command of the arena and further energised the crowd with a spirited performance, which, considering RedHook’s dynamic show, was a considerable challenge that they rose to with ease.

Don Broco launched their set with Everybody, the single from their 2016 album Technology, their third studio album but first release through American label SharpTone. (SharpTone manages the music of several Australian alt-rock and metalcore bands, such as Make Them Suffer and Brisbane’s own Stepson).

The band settled into pace – athletic guitarist Simon Delaney frequently did high kicks that would make a football cheerleader envious, whilst singer Rob Damiani jogged continuously around, like a frustrated horse preparing to hurdle an annoying paddock fence.

Three songs in they introduced new number, Celllophane (music video can be viewed here), which Rob disclosed had never been played live before in front of an audience.

Rob also revealed that tonight’s Princess Theatre concert being the debut of their Australian tour, the last time they toured Down Under also began in Brisbane (at The Triffid, a smaller venue on the north side of the river).

Rob announced that Don Broco has a new album on imminent release, but apologised for it not being ready – apparently some last-minute tinkering is being done.

Soon afterwards drummer Matt Donnelly breaks a cymbal stand – quickly replaced – and the other band members joke that he has a habit of damaging his equipment.

The band encourages the audience to circle-dance in the moshpit, then thumped into the song Gumshield, about a boxer wearing mouth protection.

The song includes the lyrics, “Do I have to body slam everybody in the room to prove my point ‘Cause I will slam everybody in the room to prove my point!” Thankfully, although the crowd did indeed crash into each other in a motley of spirited slam-dancing, no one felt inspired to punch their neighbour.

Before playing their song Uber, from 2021 album Amazing Things, Rob announced it was an anti-racist message, and dedicated it to the victims of the Israeli genocide in Gaza, eliciting warm supporting cheers from the crowd.

Incidentally, the first single from Amazing Things, second track Manchester Super Reds No.1 Fan, (also played at Princess Theatre), was originally promoted by the band pretending their Instagram account was hacked, whilst posting a number of photos of England and Manchester United FC soccer legend David Beckham.

Further highlights at Princess Theatre included:

A synchronised jump in which the crowd and the band crouched down low, then all leapt up in unison.
The audience divided in half and encouraged to yell, “Yippie kay-yay!” while the band members determined which sector of the crowd was louder,
The live debut of another new song, Hype Man, from their forthcoming album (view the music video here).

After the final song of the main set, the aforementioned new track Hype Man, Rob declared, “We’re going to walk off the stage and pretend we’re leaving, but we’ll be back in a few seconds.”

They departed, and after several minutes the band returned for their two-song encore, Fingernails and T-Shirt Song. During the latter, Rob encouraged everyone to remove their T-shirts and swing them around their heads. The majority of the crowd complied, resulting in a lot of sweaty shirts swung like drunken helicopters lurching in cross-winds.

The band’s name is odd – and bears no relation to the similar-titled Mob movie Donnie Brasco that pairs Johnny Depp with Al Pacino as an FBI informer befriending an Italian gangster. ‘Don’ is an Italian word meaning ‘Boss’, often used as an honorific title for the leaders of crime families.

Singer Rob (who has an Italian surname – Damiani is the plural of Damiano, from Latin Damianus, meaning ‘from the family of Damiano’) explained the origin in a 2016 interview.

“The long, boring story in a nutshell is that one of the original names floating about was ‘Don Loco’ [‘Boss Lunatic’]. Then Simon broke his wrist playing football and I made the terrible joke that we should change the name to Don Broco. We had nothing else going for us, so it stuck.”

Don Broco Set List

Everybody

Pretty

Cellophane (Live debut)

Manchester Super Reds No.1 Fan

You Wanna Know

Bruce Willis

Superlove