Little Bands

Be there for your favourite new band’s first and only 15 minutes of infamy.

Little Bands was a scene that ran parallel to punk in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s. It started when synth-punk mavericks Primitive Calculators were living in North Fitzroy, next door to fellow local renegade and electronic post-punk pioneer Ollie Olsen, who led the great Whirlywirld. Olsen was not only a central figure in the Little Bands scene but also played a crucial role in shaping underground music, influencing the electronic and alternative music landscapes, both at the time and in the years to follow.

Together, Primitive Calculators, Olsen, and the iconic Marie Hoy put on nights where side-projects would form to play once or twice for no more than fifteen minutes at a time. It was about attitude, not ability. If you were keen to stick it to the industry and make music for the sake of it, you were in. Equipment was shared. Non-musicians jammed with musicians. Experienced players searched out new instruments. Outfits with names like Too Fat to Fit Thru the Door and Thrush & The Cunts, would storm on stage to blast out a set, then hang out to see what happened next. The divide between audience and performer dissolved into a surge of experimentation and creativity.

Now we’re reigniting the spark for RISING 2025 across three iconic local music venues. The reins have been handed over to some legendary local labels and noise-nicks, Chapter Music, Liquid Architecture, and Cease and Desist. Together, they know who to call from the city’s respective multi-generational punk, indie, electronic, experimental, ambient, noise, art and jazz scenes. All we have to do is show up and witness the unrepeatable.

Little Bands Curator Lineup

See Session Details for venue door times.

Cease and Desist

Over 50 years since the original Little Bands splintered into 15-minute bursts, the legacy mutates again. Part supergroup, part house show — more than 20 noisemakers, one night only, throwaway bands built to self-destruct. Witness the unrepeatable.

Chapter Music

Blowing the dust off Melbourne’s most iconic pub corner, Chapter Music: Little Bands inhabit Young and Jackson’s front bar bandroom with an assembly of musicians from the last 45+ years of Australian DIY spirit for an inter-generational dialogue.

Beloved indie label Chapter Music first re-released the legendary 1980 Little Bands EP on a CD back in 2006. The spontaneity and fierce post-punk immediacy of the Little Band world has been a well of inspiration that the label has drawn from many times over the years, including working with Little Band instigators like Primitive Calculators and Use No Hooks on music new and old.

Liquid Architecture : DJ Quartets

“What might a quartet of DJs sound like?”

Happening in the basement of Wax Museum Records, Flinders Street. In 'DJ Quartets', Liquid Architecture revisits the collaborative spirit of the Little Bands scene—where anyone could grab an instrument and take the stage. Equipped with CDJs and DJ mixers Naarm/Melbourne's leading art and music creatives will form original DJ ensembles, channeling the same DIY ethos to imagine and explore the sound of a possible future.