About the Artist
waist are stepping off the speedway, but by no means is the interstate post-punk duo slowing down. After the break-neck fervent singles of ‘mtv’ and ‘bravado’ comes the cinematic third single ‘god left (this place long ago)’, featuring Soft Porn (Jye Geltch). Mania melts into tormented noir, brooding power-doom veering in an atmospheric direction.
The sonic kineticism that’s defined waist so far is by no means weakened, as the evocative lyricism in ‘god left’ paints a dream-like landscape, propelled forward as each verse transitions to the next songwriter without pause for wasted choruses. It’s true to form emotion-based songwriting, something intrinsically post-rock in discarding traditional verse-chorus progression. Seeped in gothic tones, Alistair’s resonant baritone shines in the opening. Sam, who receives frequent praise online for his vocal resemblance to Robert Smith of The Cure, tackles a distinctly different sound in ‘god left’ with sensitive light vocals.
Citing the thought of being lost in a desert as the song’s inspiration, Sam says the accompanying music video plays on nostalgic memories of yum-cha throughout his childhood. With a vibrant expired-film-like blue wash, the director Phoebe Faye and DOP/Editor Tayla Lauren list their own childhood association with abstract music videos on RAGE as inspiration.
On the songwriting, Alistair says,
“I was listening to a tonne of Midnight Oil when I wrote it - I wanted to evoke that imagery of the Australian desert and how it kinda feels like another planet. It’s magical but also empty and sort of apocalyptic. Then tying that into feelings of loss and surreality, like everything’s crashing down around you but it almost doesn’t feel real.”
Since their debut in 2025, waist have appeared at St Kilda Festival and Valley Crawl Festival, sharing stages with the likes of Shag Rock, Le Shiv, Sacred Hearts, Sunsick Daisy, and more. While Soft Porn hasn’t been available to share the live stage for their featured verse, Alistair keeps a printed portrait taped to the back of his black warlock, which he holds up to the mic at the right moment
Independent Music, Amplified