Album Review: Peter Bibby - Grand Champion

Back in 2014, Peter Bibby hit the local music scene with a debut album that both celebrated and bemoaned the minutiae of day-to-day living in modern Australia. Delivered in a broad Australian accent, his songs were littered with profanity, casual observations and humour. The key was in how he wrapped it all up in an interesting collection of styles from alt-country to indie-rock, psychedelia to lounge music. It’s a trick worth repeating and in some cases on its follow-up, improving.

Musically he’s widened his palette, it sounds more sophisticated and the production is a real step up from the lower-fi charm of Butcher/Hairstylist/Beautician. In the first song alone (Palm Springs) he travels from a loose country jam into baroque, piano-accented pop, then on into a Crazy Horse, choppy guitar workout and finishes with a speeding up/falling apart finale. The variation on the album is its winning feature. Medicine is rolling and warm with a demon hook of a chorus, Long Baby tumbles down stairs like a Supergrass/Strokes hybrid, Pissbird Flowertruck is a hoedown that survives on charm more than it does as a well-written song. The single Work For Arseholes is a clarion call to slackers - an honest statement of principle over profit. It’s the moment on the album where Bibby’s voice and lyrics sit in perfect tandem with the musical arrangement.

With a song like Fuck Me and the ramshackle joke/not-joke swing at the free-love, incense burning Hippies, Bibby treads a fine line between novelty songs and astute and intellectual songwriting. The truth lies somewhere in the middle, as Bibby continues his eccentric, larrikin-laced journey through popular culture.