Primo! + Lower Plenty + Constant Mongrel + Hot Topic (18+)

Melbourne-based punk-pop group Primo! will release their debut album Amici worldwide on July 13 through UK indie label Upset The Rhythm, which they will celebrate with a Melbourne launch show at The Tote on Friday, July 20.

Having recorded Amici as a trio, Primo! is now a four-piece, featuring Xanthe Waite (vocals/guitar), Violetta DelConte Race (vocals/guitar) and Suzanne Walker (vocals/drums), now joined by Amy Hill on bass.

Writing up-tempo, terse chorus and verse, Primo! make use of two guitars, drums, sound effects and a group vocal sensibility to ornament their enquiries into deconstructed punk and indie rock. Their songs chime and charm, sounding at times bountiful, at others brittle, always buoyant with attention to detail.

Amici is Primo!'s debut album, following on from their split 7" last year and a cassette of early work entitled Primo Cassetto from 2016 on Hidiotic. Amici was recorded and mixed by friend Al Montfort throughout 2017. The collected songs reference the 40-hour working week, the city, bureaucracy, walking, a mirage and a ghost. In form the songs are short and purposeful, "leaving footsteps in the snow" much like the protagonist of their wistful invocation to Daphne.

A sense of haste and motion is imbued through Primo!'s songs, linking up with the album's lyrical themes of acute observation, mindful conservancy and the dislocated meaning behind modern life. "Got the paper, got the pen, got the deadline, in the line, out of traffic, got the stapler", they sing united on Future. Bronte Blues is a similar rapid tumble of melody and problem solving, detonated by the line "you're a magnetic strip, living on borrowed chips". The vocal clarity of these tracks place Primo! promptly in our own heads, the band's intriguing lyrics springing forth like our very own flights of fancy. There's an honesty and emotional distance at play in these songs too, with their instructions, lists and procedures leaking into our semblance of self. "Tell me more, tell me more" voice the band throughout Disco Eyeballs. The quest to lucidly understand underpins the whole record.

Primo take you from A-to-B with their songs, from the appetite of another place to the bird's eye view. Family Dinner Club deals with anonymity and suburbia, whilst Ticking Off A List admits "there's a fogginess to some beauty, you look outside, I can't know what you see" before urging us to take to the footpath. You've Got A Million races all over town, whilst Closed Tomorrow talks of "a car going by, one day out of life, going home or to another man-made space". These songs are alive and inquisitive, chasing down questions for answers long sped-away, amidst minimalist shuffle beats and ringing-out chords. Amici is a triumph of the underplayed, its small details pull focus, allowing the album to treat us to unexpected truths in plain sight.

Primo's newest member since 2018 is Amy Hill, who also plays in Terry and Constant Mongrel, on bass. Outside of Primo, Xanthe and Violetta have both lent their guitar skills to Terry and The Shifters respectively, whilst Suzanne works in film.

The band's debut album Amici will be released as LP and CD on Upset The Rhythm on July 13 and followed up in August with a European tour after their July 20 Melbourne launch at The Tote, where tickets are $10+bf through Oztix.

Check out Primo! on Bandcamp
Upset The Rhythm

Primo! + Lower Plenty + Constant Mongrel + Hot Topic (18+)
Friday, July 20
The Tote, 67-71 Johnston St, Collingwood
Ph: 03 9419 5320

Tickets:  $10 +bf through Oztix; $12 on the door (if available)
Doors 8pm