Melvins frontman Buzz Osborne (aka King Buzzo) is headed to Australia for a 10-date solo acoustic tour of Australia in August. With a career spanning 31 years, 30 albums, and over 2,000 live performances, this tour marks the first time that the monarch of metal has performed acoustically in intimate settings.

Here’s a 4-CD collection of rough gems from Latin America, Spain and South America that sums up all that’s great about ‘60s garage rock and roll.

Life’s tough at the top and Pismo Beach’s finest exponents of rock and roll wrestling, the Psychotic Turnbuckles, can’t just lie around on Southern Californian beaches sipping champagne all year.

They’re escaping the Northern Hemisphere summer and heading back to Sydney in June for a brief taste of how the other half lives.

Impossible to ignore Aussie magazine "Unbelievably Bad" is celebrating its milestone 13th issue with a live gig and more at Sydney's Factory Theatre on July 19. Kicking off at 4pm in the arvo and going long into the night, the event will feature a healthy line-up of bands and a record fair.

Twenty bucks gets you live performances by Meat Cake, White Knuckle Fever, Chinese Burns Unit, Join The Amish, Hostile Objects, The VeeBees...plus a very special guest band.

Our favourite Canadian-born guitarist, Chris Masuak of Radio Birdman/Screaming Tribesmen/Hitmen fame, has a cheap and cheerful film clip doing the rounds online for the B side of his "Another Lost Weekend" single on Spanish label New H. Here's "Animal".

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Since, I was recently taken back by Suzie Stapleton’s compelling performance at the Bitter Sweet Kicks album launch Prince in St Kilda on Anzac Day, I did some searching. I found Suzie’s hypnotic and dark EP, “Obadi Diablo”, and it’s been on heavy airplay for more than two weeks. I contacted Ms Stapleton and requested a copy of her self-released debut EP of a few years back. Again, I was not to be disappointed.

Melbourne’s Bitter Sweet Kicks believe in the ethos of hitting hard and fast and then moving on. Each of their three releases to date has been a seven-track affair, long on dirty, high energy rock and roll and short on indulgences.

Their influences couldn’t be more obvious if they’d stamped the words: ‘AC/DC’, ‘Dictators’ and ‘Joan Jett’ on their heads with a branding iron. If you like this hard rock outfit from Arizona, the good news is that there are two more recent albums with which to assault your senses.

It’s been a long time since Garry Gray strode stages in Australia with a de-toothed chainsaw swinging at hip level as he fronted the psychodramatic Sacred Cowboys, so it’s reassuring to hear his menacing tones emanating from a studio again. This four-track EP is a taster to an album and measures up to expectations nicely.