Release Date June 26th, 2026
Format CD/LP
Genre Psychedelic Rock
Origin Melbourne, Australia
Child emerged from Melbourne with a blunt mixture of blues emotion, hard rock volume, and soul detail and late-sixties psychedelia. The band’s self-titled debut appeared in 2014, followed by “Blueside” in 2016 and the live-to-tape EP “I” in 2018. Those releases placed long guitar passages, loose rhythmic motion and bruised vocals at the center of Child’s music, with the stage serving as the main testing ground. Years of Australian and international touring gave the trio a rough, road-worn character born from pubs, long distances and repeated nights under hot amplifiers. Mathias Northway handles guitar and vocals, Michael Lowe plays drums and Rhys Kelly the bass.
Their approach draws from blues tradition without treating it as sacred property, adding psychedelic color and hard rock volume whenever the songs call for a wider shape. “Rebirth” is the band’s fourth full-length album and its first release through Heavy Psych Sounds Records. It arrives after an eight-year gap from “I” and nearly a decade after “Blueside”, so the shorter writing and compact arrangements mark a notable change in scale. The album is dedicated to David Paul of Orpheus Pickups and The Guitar Hospital, a figure closely linked to the band’s equipment and development. Child remains rooted in the electric blues, though “Rebirth” presents a more restrained version of that language, placing the songs ahead of extended wandering and trimming away much of the excess associated with psychedelic blues rock. The band’s history has always been tied to performance, improvisation and volume, while this release turns more attention toward concise structures and vocal hooks. That shift does not erase the old Child character. It places it inside a smaller frame, with less wandering and more emphasis on emotional damage.
“Rebirth” runs for around half an hour, spread across six songs, and its compact shape gives the album little space for detours. The sessions took place at Wrangler Studios in Melbourne, where Tim Maxwell handled engineering and mixing, with Nick Di Lorenzo completing the mastering at Panorama Mastering. The production has a warm analogue grain, a broad bass presence and guitars that rasp, swell and flare, with rough human edges intact. Northway’s voice sounds worn and strained, often sitting close to the front of the mix, while Lowe and Kelly provide a heavy shuffle that moves between restraint and sudden release.
The drums are dry and close, the bass has enough depth to anchor the lower register, and the guitar tone shifts from scorched chords to stretched blues leads. No part of the mix is dressed up for radio, and the raw surface suits the trio’s physical style. “Woman Like You”, “Forgot How To Love” and “Damned Heart” examine relationships from a bruised position, while “Heavy Load”, “I Tried” and “Cold Shoulder” turn inward toward failure, fatigue and resistance. These subjects are presented in plain language, with no grand philosophy added to ordinary damage. The shorter arrangements suit Child’s current course, since the riffs arrive early and the vocal lines receive more space than on their older releases.
At times, the limited running time leaves certain melodic ideas underdeveloped, and a few passages settle into predictable blues rock motions before the next turn arrives. The playing remains precise, especially when the rhythm section drops into a deep shuffle and Northway stretches a guitar line past the expected bar. “Rebirth” has enough friction and emotional strain to rise above routine revivalism, though its compact scale prevents the album from reaching the feverish peaks of Child’s live reputation. This is focused heavy blues with a scorched voice, raw guitar tone and songs shaped by regret, recovery and personal damage.
|7.0
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