Is that a mandolin? Or a twelve-string? Or a zither? These are the questions that spring to mind hearing ‘Chinese Restaurant’, the final song on Naarm quartet Radio Free Alice’s Empty Words EP and the most beguiling song the band have recorded to date. Quickly, they are replaced by a more pertinent question: Who is that singing? The vocal that steps forward sounds nothing like lead singer Noah Learmonth’s typical boyish yawn, more of a sleazebag drawl seemingly styled on Isaac Wood, Ryan Davis and Kirin J Callinan. And yet Learmonth it is, yet another flash of the chameleonic voice and theatre-kid flair that seems to be able to inhabit whatever kind of rockstar he could possibly want to be.

That star power is one big reason why I feel like Radio Free Alice might be one of the most significant Australian rock exports of their generation. And even when Learmonth threatens to throw the promise of indie fame away, plunging that voice to unsettling depths as he does on ‘Chinese Restaurant’, the rest of the band seem to have a sixth sense for when it’s time to reel him back from the brink with a chiming riff or flirty bassline, or to simply ratchet up the tempo and play so fast it all becomes unintelligible. This is what it feels like to see the band live in action, conjuring sheer noise and power to the point where the pit is less of a mosh than a writhing throng of devotees.

All this qualification might make it sound like Radio Free Alice are a more fickle band to love than they are. Not so: they make soaring, hooky alt-rock as naturally as any Australian band this side of, I don’t know, Silverchair in 2007? Case in point, ‘Toyota Camry’. Fair play, boys, that riff is fucken phenomenal. And not content to rest on a laurel, the band rise to the occasion, rhythm section charging the song with a chugging momentum, Learmonth hitting upon a melody that seems to topple over itself as he belts out a queasy lyric about a friend unmoored: “Everyone says you don’t look so great / hold on to your happy boy memory / cellophane bag on your head, you don’t feel so great”. I’d be slightly embarrassed to publicise the number of times I’ve listened to the song in the process of writing this review but not once have I tired of it. It’s a little bit flawless.

The words I used to describe the EP’s title track, ‘Empty Words’, when it came out in February were swooning but disaffected, polished but personable, with clear ambitions of grandeur and I would add to that assessment by noting Radio Free Alice’s newfound command over form. The Cure, the Strokes, the Chameleons: these are a few of the seminal post-punk influences that, on previous releases, the band passionately, audibly channelled. Here, Learmonth’s voice echoes another touchstone of that lineage, David Byrne’s baritone yelp. But the song – nervy and kinetic as it is – couldn’t be further from Talking Heads, with the band instead serving up a strong dose of indie sleaze to be prescribed when The Dare just isn’t cutting it. Here is a sound that Radio Free Alice can call definitively their own, at least in 2025. It’s thrilling to hear such a studied outfit embrace the kind of lacquered sheen that could propel them to rock stardom.

There’s one more flicker of glory I hear on the EP that I would be remiss not to mention, tucked away in the final minute of the melancholy punk stepper ‘Regret’. In the shadow of a wide-eyed, sweet’n’sour chorus, Learmonth vaults into a stratospheric falsetto, “you’re looking so lo-oooow”, contorting that final syllable in all directions until it recalls less a soundwave than a gaseous cloud of pure feeling. And it reminds me, quite sharply, of someone the band might loathe me for making a comparison out of. Chris Martin. The pretence-deficient frontman of, well, Coldplay, whose great gift is the ability to lift his voice up and above worldly concerns, to an emotional altitude where no suggestion of lameness can any longer be heard. The point being: within every great rock band there has always been an appropriate degree of both mysterious allure and plain sincerity. Radio Free Alice display plenty of cool on this record, but it is perhaps a more exciting development that Empty Words proves the band can yearn with the best of them.

80

Sam Gollings

22 August 2025