Current Issue #488

Cosmic Psychos: Blokes you can Trust

Cosmic Psychos: Blokes you can Trust

Matt Weston’s engaging and hilarious rockumentary on Australian yob rock veterans Cosmic Psychos is a warts and all look at the unlikely influence of the 30-year-old band that at first appear to be a bunch of bogans who thrash out pub punk.

Matt Weston’s engaging and hilarious rockumentary on Australian yob rock veterans Cosmic Psychos is a warts and all look at the unlikely influence of the 30-year-old band that at first appear to be a bunch of bogans who thrash out pub punk. With farmer Ross Knight as the band’s leader, this muscle-bound bassplayer and vocalist is a brilliant character to base a doco around. Like the music of the band, Knight is a no-bullshit,straight to the point country boy who likes beer, rocking and his farm. The Psychos, along with The Hard-Ons (who appear in the doco) and The Scientists, were part of a group of Aussie 80s bands tha influenced the Seattle grunge sound with their raw fuzz take on punk. An all-star lineup of grunge and punk identities appear to talk of the Psychos’ influence including Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder, Mudhoney, L7 and The Melvins. But it’s Knight who is the star. He is this country’s most unlikely rock’n’roll identity, as he talks about his rise from a man who likes beer, footy and cricket, and who didn’t want to leave Australia to tour Europe, to a rock’n’roll veteran who pranks and drinks his way through America and falls in love with a New York S&M queen. Knight’s life is full of strange juxtapositions: how many punk rockers are champion power lifters? How many farmers don S&M gear? Brilliantly captured by Weston, who smartly uses animation to showcase scenes from the band’s history, Blokes You Can Trust is a very Australian tale about an improbable group of underground rock heroes.  

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