vicious kitten

_{Colin Gray (right) with Kim Salmon.}

It’s been another productive year at Vicious Kitten Records with new album releases by Kevin K & The Bowery Kats, Pillbox NYC and (next month) the new album by Melbourne outfit Girl Monstar, who have reformed and recorded a new album after a 30 year hiatus!

Before I get to my top 10, I want to acknowledge the efforts of two cats who are responsible for the incredible sound and artwork on the Vicious Kitten releases – being sound wiz Ernie O at his Urban Fringe Compound, and the best graphic artist in the biz, Mark Rubenstein. I cannot recommend these two guys enough. If you need creative design/art for your project in 2026, Mark is your man. In terms of rock ‘n’ roll highpoints for the year just gone, it’s challenging to narrow it down to 10, but here goes……..

1. Chris Masuak’s Dog Soldier - "Chris Masuak’s Dog Soldier"
Chris Klondike Masuak returned in 2025 with renewed fire in the belly and creative juices overflowing to deliver one of THE rock albums of the year. Masuak has released many killer solo albums – but this is arguably his magnum opus. That’s not a statement I make lightly either, given the high calibre of material on 2019's "Address To The Nation" and 2016's "Brujita" albums in particular. I’ve stated many times that as a solo artist the rock 'n' roll he is crafting stands on its on merit and is on par with the output of any of his previous bands. Dog Soldier goes one better. The songs are killer, the playing is first rate, the sound is sonically superb thanks to mastering guru Ernie O and the album artwork is terrific. This is the complete rock ‘n’ roll package and one of THE Australian albums of 2025. Check it here.

2. Anne McCue & The Cubists – "Wholly Roller Coaster"
Once championed by the likes of Lucinda Williams and Nancy Wilson, Nashville based Australian singer/songwriter/guitarist Anne McCue has released several great albums of inspired blues-oriented roots rock over recent years, but in 2025 she has gone one better with the release of "Wholly Roller Coaster". This is an album of stunning psych pop with a nod to "Sgt Peppers..." and swirling surrealism that stands as of the best releases of the year for mine. An amalgam of kaleidoscopic pop and lyrical themes that focus on the wonder of life, this is one you need to hear. It’s out on vinyl too.  Check it here.

3. Smoked Salmon – "Smoked Salmon"
I can’t recall if this was released late last year or early 2025, yet Kim Salmon did a run of shows in March this year to support the album’s release and live, particularly with Claire Birchall doing a lot of the lifting, it was another musical high point for the year. "Hey Hey Narcissus", "Hell In A Handbasket" and the killer "How Did They Ever Manage" are just three highpoints from an outstanding album, with the enigmatic Kim Salmon again coming up with the goods. Check it here.

4. Peter Simpson – "Good Times Gone Bad"
A conventional mainstream music profile counts for a lot. It means you can release an album and an established fanbase will both hear and or purchase it. Media marketing also creates awareness and means it may reach new ears and sales. Despite a rock pedigree extending back some four decades, (including the Dubrovniks), Sydney based singer-songwriter Peter Simpson is neither a household name or part of the mainstream. In 2025, he did however, release an album of stellar garage rock that should, in a just world, elevate his musical profile to that aforementioned mainstream status – it’s that good. Littered with strong hooks and catchy melodies, this is one of THE Oz releases of 2025 and one you need to hear.  Check it here.

5. The Naked Lunch – "Wish You Well"
The Naked Lunch released a stupendous album of supreme power pop in 2023 called "Real Gone". They have a new six track CD out called 'Wish You Well' that goes one better. A ton of hooks, pop sensibilities and killer riffs. This is their third release since 2020 and if you haven't yet got on board - you need to! With a lineup whose pedigree includes Steve Beves (Melting Skyscrapers), Tony 'The Kid’ Roberston of The Hitmen/New Christs/Hitmen DTK, Tony Jukic of Hitmen DTK and Murray Shephard of the Screaming Tribesmen, Fun Things and Hitmen DTK – you know there is musical muscle behind the material – and what great material it is. "Wishing Well" and "Sammy’s Made My Day" are just two of my faves, yet the entire six tracks are killer. Check it here. 

6. Pilots Of Baalbek + The Undermines, Dissent Bar, Canberra 12 July 2025
A night of incendiary Rock Action on a freezing Canberra winter night from the two best bands in the nation’s capital. Pilots of Baalbek have two great albums out and a style that fuses retro vibes with modern power resulting in a sound that is quite their own. Their last album, "By The Seat Of Our Pants", is essential, and its on LP as well. The Undermines slayed all with their legitimate stamp of high energy rock that draws from the Motor City to the New Christs and then some. They released a four-track EP this year called "Holy Fool" and its essential. Check out the Pilots here, and the Undermines here.

7. Hollywood Brats – "Hung Like Stallions"
There have been some notable rock ‘n’ rollers important to me pass on this year - including David Johansen, Rick Derringer, Honest John Plain of The Boys and Andrew Mattheson of the Hollywood Brats. Although the Brats only released the one album before splintering off to The Boys and London SS in the mid-'70s, both that album and legit-star frontman Andrew Matthewson laid the blueprint that so many would follow. There's a cool label out of Norway called Big Dipper Records doing their best to reissue and release new material from some of Norway’s best – and this year they released an album of previously unreleased material by the Hollywood Brats called "Hung Like Stallions" and it has all the swagger and raunch ‘n’ roll that defined the Brats. 100% recommended.

8. Ricky Byrd - "NYC Made"
Most well known as guitar-slinger for Joan Jett and the Blackhearts for a decade (until '91), Ricky Byrd released his fourth solo album this year and its his most interesting, most personal album to date. A proud Bronx native raised in Queens and a lifelong Yankees fan, Byrd pays homage to the soundtrack of his youth with this album, with influences from the Raspberries to The Who to The Stones to The Yardbirds and Sam Cooke. It’s a rock-solid album with plenty of memorable and catchy tunes, including ‘Transistor Radio Childhood’, and the Mott The Hoople-like ‘Glamdemic’ Blues’. Great record this one! Check it here 

9. Richard Davies and the Dissidents - "High Times & Misdemeanours"
The sophomore album from Richard Davies is stunning. He is one of a handful or UK artists I consider essential listening. Slyder Smith is another, so too the incredible Marc Valentine if you dig contemporary power pop done right with a nod to the past. Both these guys have new singles out that are worth checking out. Anyway, Davies cut his teeth with underrated London alt-country/ Americana outfit The Snakes and released his debut album in 2020. His new album betters it, and channels Southside Johnny & The Ashbury Jukes, Tom Petty and Ian Hunter to great effect. He is one hell of a singer-songwriter with High Times & Misdemeanours one hell of an album. The powerful cover of Divinyls' "Human On The Inside" reason enough alone to check it out.

10. Tyla J. Pallas - Gilding the Lily
The brand-new album from Tyla (the Dogs D'amour) was released in in 2025 and it’s a monster, with 18 tracks and a range of styles – from pirate ballads to romantic hobo tunes to gritty and raw blooze numbers characterised by whiskey-soaked vocals and a ton of heart – there’s a legitimacy and originality to Tyla that makes him unique. He is still a cult fave in the UK, yet hopefully (optimistically even) Gilding The Lily may see him tour beyond Blighty and out to this old colony one day. We live in hope! Check it here.

Cadallac Man – Kevin K (Vicious Kitten Records)

Around these parts, Kevin K records are like a comfortable pair of slippers: You slide in and feel at home with his slashing or chugging guitar and mewling vocal drawl. This record is sized extra-large with 26 songs putting it in the realm of what used to be called a double album.

For the uninitiated (and shamefully there still are some), Kevin K is a Buffalo, New York State raised, New York City-tempered veteran of the Lower East Side-CBGB scene, who remains musically true to that long-gone playground. This is his 33rd album of gritty, street-level rock and roll, and it’s more of the same.

Trailblazing Melbourne garage-pop/hard rock band Girl Monstar are back with their first new music since 1992.

The new album with the very Rolling Stonesy title of  “GRRRR!!” will be released on January 27 via Vicious Kitten Records. Pre-orders are already open at the Girl Monstar Bandcamp here.

The first single “Blue Cat With Green Eyes: is out now and second single “Hate Train” is coming on November 20.  

Girl Monstar were the first all-female band to gain a national profile in Australia in the late '80s and early ‘90s.

(There's a mini documentary telling their story after the SEE MORE link.)

We Got A Right – The Golden Rat (Vicious Kitten Records)

What do you get when expat bi-coastal American underground star Mr Ratboy collides with Hiroshi The Golden Arm (aka Japan’s Johnny Thunders) in a Tokyo garage, each armed with the songs that pre-occupied their formative musical minds in the period spanning 1976-82? An absolutely killer album.

“We Got A Right” is a record that came about through necessity. Hiroshi The Golden Arm and Mr Ratboy first met in 1993 when the latter was a member of Jeff Dahl’s touring band. Fast forward a few years and Mr Ratboy is a resident of the Land of the Rising Sun and the pair strike up a musical partnership in the electro-trash outfit Ace Killers Union. 

Trailblazing Melbourne garage-pop/hard rock band Girl Monstar are back with their first new music since 1992. 

The first all-female band to gain a national profile in Australia in the late '80s and early ‘90s. Girl Monstar played more than 200 shows and shared stages with Iggy Pop, the Ramones, Sonic Youth, the Hard-ons, GOD, the Hoodoo Gurus, The Divinyls, Poison and Skid Row.

You can hear and buy the new single “Blue Cat With Green Eyes" on Bandcamp and it will be followed by a new album, on Vicious Kitten Records, in October.

“Blue Cat With Green Eyes” is the impetus for the reunion and was written by singer-guitarist Sherry Rich as part of a Philosophy Unit while studying a Creative Arts Industries degree in 2017.

Broken – Kevin k (Vicious Kitten) 

Recorded with all dials in the red in a basement in the cold of a Michigan winter, “Broken” shows Bowery veteran Kevin K is anything but. Your sound system may be, though, after 12 songs that don’t skimp on distortion.

Glossy production and Kevin K have rarely been mentioned in the same breath. Ironically, his most polished record, “Magic Touch”, also came out on Vicious Kitten 23 years ago. Apart from being on the same imprint, “Broken” bears no resemblance and sounds like Blue Cheer.

Kevin K played all the instruments on “Broken” (with some minor drum machine assistance) and the production is homespun. The “never too loud” ethos and claustrophobic feel might leave you gasping for breath midway through but I suspect that’s the intention. 

Canberra label Vicious Kitten is releasing a previously unheard 1991 live album by Hitmen DTKwith special guest Deniz Tek of Radio Birdmanthis week.

“Tonight We Ride: Official Bootleg Live in Sydney November 13 1991” is a warts and all recording from a Sydney show at lost venue Toucan Tango. Tek guested to promote the “Moronic Inferno” album by Hitmen DTK that he’d participated on.

Identity Crisis b/w Song For Lulu –Kevin K & Ricky Rat (Vicious Kitten)

If you had to ask: Kevin K is an indefatigable product of the halcyon New York underground rock and roll scene and one of a handful of the CBGB crew still standing and delivering. Ricky Rat co-founded Detroit’s Trash Brats, larger-than-life dealers of flash glam, and more recently a member of the Cheetah Chrome and Johnny Blitz-led, reconstituted Dead Boys.  The pair spawned an album, “Party Store”, in 2020 and this single features two of its songs.

You shouldn’t be surprised that it rocks or that it’s on Vicious Kitten, the Aussie label that grew from the zine of the same name that variously championed Kevin K, his previous band the Road Vultures and the Trash Brats. The zine lives on in The Australian Rock Show podcast, by the way, and the record imprint has been revived after a 15-year hiatus to issue this seven-inch.  

Tonight We Ride: Official Bootleg Live in Sydney November 13 1991 – Hitmen DTK with special guest Deniz Tek (Vicious Kitten)

Hello I-94 barflies! Ain’t life grand? A new official bootleg recording of the magnificent Hitmen DTK, with special guest Deniz Tek, ripping through a few choice cuts from the Birdman catalogue, How good is that? 

But first, the back story.

Hitmen DTK were fresh back from recording the underrated album “Moronic Inferno” in the USA. They hit the road to promote said record in Sydney, Australia, for a handful of gigs.  

Everybody of a certain vintage who follows non-mainstream rock and roll has a soft spot for ‘zines. One of the reasons you’re reading this electronic magazine is down to two, 48 Crash and Vicious Kitten.

48 Crash was the archetypal Sydney zine of the early ‘80s. Hand-written (and coloured, sometimes), its photocopied pages spoke of Le Hoodoo Gurus, the Visitors, the three-piece Screaming Tribesmen and the Lipstick Killers - bands that struggled to attract mainstream attention elsewhere. It championed the so-called Detroit Sound that fuelled the Sydney music scene for more than a decade.

Ten years later, Vicious Kitten was an offshoot of the record label of the same name and professional publication that aimed its lens at people like Johnny Thunders, Kevin K, Jeff Dahl and Freddy Lynxx. Very Lower East Side, in spirit.

An honourable mention also to Sydney's B Side, that covered the left-of-centre, extreme local musical scene. Unbelievably Bad fills the same niche today. There were the rock local papers (RAM, the bible, and Juke) that were consumed religiously, but zines had all the cool stuff and never mentioned Chisel, Icehouse or Farnham. 

Keepin’ Up With The Jones – The Ballbusters (Vicious Kitten)

You might question the validity of this four-song EP from the Worcester, Massachusetts, band that used to be Rick Blaze and The Ballbustersuntil their frontman’s demise in 2011 following protracted health issues. After all, it’s been 23 years since their second album and first for Vicious Kitten(the “Manhattan Babylon” CD) and one of the guitarists, Dave Cuneo, has also since shuffled off this mortal coil.

It was easy back then to write off Rick Blaze and The Ballbusters as yet another Thunders-besotted outfit from the backblocks whose fascination for JT's dubious lifestyle choices got in the way of them making it out of their own backyard. The cover art for this EP is all a bit too obvious but its arrival prompted re-visits of “Manhattan Babylon” and its 2001 follow-up “People’s Republic of Rock and Roll”, and they retrospectively hold up as righteous slices of swagger that owe as much to Mick and Keef as  J. Genzales.  

Calling From Nowhere Land: Live in Vancouver 1994 – Pillbox (Vicious Kitten)

Pillbox wasn’t a household name in the 1990s – unless you lived in what was left of New York City’s Lower East Side tenements and had a big jones for swaggering sleaze rock.

The band’s solitary long-player, “Jimbo’s Clown Room”, came out on CD way back in ’93 and despite being re-released on vinyl, their output remains so far from the mainstream of modern popular music to qualify Pillbox for lifetime outsider status. Just like you.

Shadow Work 38 – Kevin K and The Bowery Kats (Vicious Kitten)

Simple songs rendered with heart: Lower East Side punk rock survivor Kevin K has adhered to that formula over four decades and “Shadow Work 38” doesn’t make any case for change.

If you’re not familiar with Kevin K, “Shadow Work 38” is a good place to start. Despite his longevity, he’s still a well-kept secret. The man’s understated YouTube bio sums him up:

Opened for Johnny Thunders , Dead Boys , Ramones . I have seen it all. Was part of the CBGB club from 1980- 2000. I have 30 CDs available and a book, ‘The Successful Loser’.

Rosewood – Kevin K and The Bowery Kats (Vicious Kitten)

Around these parts, a new Kevin Kalbum feels just like an old pair of slippers. The sound is lived in, equal parts Johnny Thunders, Stones and the New York Dolls,and the lyrical themes (usually loss, drugs and swimming against the tide) sit just right. Familiarity does not breed contempt. 

Some folks say Kevin K is in the thrall of Thunders and there’s an awful lot of JT in his guitar squall and vocal drawl. That being the case, admiration stops just short of mimicry. The more enlightened think he’s giving a nod to (as opposed to being on the nod with) an enigmatic influence.

Ernie O’s 2023 Top 10

10. River of Snakes live at Northcote Social Club (supporting Chris Masuak & Dog Soldier) on 26 May. It takes a lot to make my jaw drop, but this tight and gritty 3-piece achieved it flawlessly and with ease. Raul (Magic Dirt) on guitar and vocals, Elissa (The Loveless, RnRHS) on bass and vocals and Dave (Grindhouse, Drifter) on drums wove a tapestry of love, loss and lust that draws you in and leaves you wanting more. Check out their goodies here!

9. Stu Wilson – As Yet Untitled Mini-Album. Still a work in progress, but (Loose Pills, Aberration, New Christs, The Crisps and more) has gone next level with his solo material, taking advantage of his Stu Stu Studio to lay down some tracks that wouldn’t sound out of place on a 1980’s Citadel release. We’re having a lot of fun with this! Check out a teaser here.

The Golden Rat with Joe Rizzo – “Can Any Of You Muthas Dance?”
This live recording from July 2024 went straight to digital and we're thankful someone had the nouse to preserve it. The Golden Rat headlined a tribute show in Tokyo to honour the late Walter Lure (Heartbreakers/Waldos), who passed away in 2020. Joining The Golden Rat (Hiroshi The Golden Arm and Mr Ratboy) for this special evening was drummer Joe Rizzo - who'd done time with Walter for years (and was also a member of The Waldos, Pillbox and D Generation). Killer set of Heartbreakers/Thunders tunes done right! 

Marc Valentine – "Basement Sparks" CD
My brother and I saw Marc Valentine in ‘93 in London when he was fronting power-pop outfit the Last Great Dreamers. He released a killer album a couple of years back that included Wreckless Eric and Matt Dangerfield from The Boys, but this new album, “Basement Sparks” goes one better. Great songwriter who understands the pop/hook combo very well.

 Some of the best material to come out of Ernie O’s Urban Fringe Compound over 2024, in no particular order (as these are my friends and clients, it doesn’t pay to play favourites):

Mick Medew and Ursula – In The Zone CD (I-94 Bar Records)
Mick and Ursula’s material has certainly “matured” with this release, with Ursula taking over vocal and co-writing duties on some of the more post punk styled songs ("Punk Grandma", "Invisible Woman"), while Mick’s melodic songwriting style shines on tracks like "In The Zone" and "Surfing On The Waves". This album is getting some great reviews online and from Australian independent radio stations. Available fromBandcamp. Get it!

John Kennedy and the New Originals – Live at the Marrickville Bowl (I-94 Bar Records)
John put together a stellar outfit withPete Timmerman, Phil Hall, Murray Cook andMatt Galvin, andRichard Ball captured it live to 1’s and 0’s before Phil mixed it to sound like we’re actually in the room with the band. A totally live recording with no overdubs and only some pauses removed to keep it flowing, John has curated some of the best songs from his extensive stable, and a couple of old chestnuts (includingEastern Dark’s "Julie Is A Junkie" and "Hand of Law" byRadio Birdman). Stellar! Get ithere.