Happy beer-drinking anthem from the band of Ozzie Wright and Vaughan Blakey.

It’s fifteen years ago since the Goons of Doom made their debut at a derelict hotel in Sydney.

I wrote in my notes at the time, “Music sounds like enormous molar with an abscess as big as a maraschino cherry.”

I wasn’t alone.

The music producer Pauly B, with whom Vaughan Blakey records various songs for BeachGrit Pictures, “thought we were the worst shit he’d ever heard and kicked us out of his studio,” says Vaughan. “Now he’s our manager and record label!”

This song, which is called 24 Bottles of Beer, is the first from the Goons of Doom’s new album, Black Skull Bong.

From the presser:

Australians are aggressive beer drinkers with just about every occasion imaginable yet another excuse to hit the sauce. Births, deaths, weddings, funerals, sporting events, tough day at work, team won the game, in a shit mood, in a great mood, made a sandwich, found five bucks, woke up this morning… they’re all the excuses we need to rip the scab off a frothie and drain that bitter amber nectar. Despite excessive alcohol consumption being linked to an unfathomable number of society’s problems; from health issues to all manner of violence and to death… we continue to embrace drinking as a part of our culture.

Do we have a problem?

Probably.

So what’s the deal with a song like 24 Bottles of Beer, a rousing anthemic scream for the immediate purchase and consumption of an icy cold slab?

I can imagine people thinking it’s a song that glorifies drinking,” says Vaughan Dead, “But it’s actually a piss take on that. I’m always tripping on the manic energy people put into getting fucked up. I mean, it’s definitely not an anti-drinking song so I wouldn’t say it’s addressing the matter, it’s just stepping back and observing the way we rip in, which is pretty fucken hard.”

24 Bottles of Beer was written and recorded in half a day, and harks back to other Goons classics that get a room going nuts while alienating everyone with the slightest penchant for being easily offended. “We make no apologies for that,” says Deadly. “Every song we’ve ever written has the potential to be misinterpreted, mostly cause we like making ourselves laugh, but our music is never mean and we know what we’re making. Even our dumbest shit has a conscience and a heartbeat.”

Having first formed in 2003 on Sydney’s Northern Beaches, the Goons of Doom have since relocated to Byron Bay where they recorded Black Skull Bong in the aptly named village of Goonengerry. A little older and none the wiser, the Goons of Doom have become one of Australian music’s most unlikely stayers.

"This is something I've had to deal with my whole life. I've never been in the crew."

Just two hours ago, I wrote a post pointing to the influence New Jersey vlogger Ben Gravy has had on Jamie O, Koa Rothman, as well as Kalani Robb, Brett Barley etc.

Ben’s YouTube channel has 56,000 subscribers and so many little films you could watch them back to back on a rocket ship and not even be halfway through ’em as you touch down on Mars.

His themes are positivity and an everyman vibe. If I can do it, you can sorta thing.

“Three years ago, I was twenty six years old, washed-up, barely surfed, blown-out knee with a doctor telling me I might never surf again,” Ben said in a forty-three minute vlog he made while visiting Surf Ranch. “I changed my life, I changed my mindset and today I came to the Kelly Slater wavepool and I surfed with Kelly Slater. Anything is possible. If you chase your dreams, if you put positivity and goodness into the universe, it’ll come back to you. I’m living proof.”

Good enough to be nominated for Best Web series at the 2018 Surfer Poll, yes?

In a tearful post, which you can watch by hitting the play button and scrolling through to twelve-ish minutes, Ben says,

“Three years ago, it wasn’t something I felt like I deserved. (But) right now, the way that surfing stands, I deserve to be nominated.”

“I’ve worked tirelessly for three years to accomplish the goals I’ve put in front of me.”

“I put out an immense amount of positivity though my videos. I bring laughter and joy and stoke to the world of surfing.” 

“I’ve never been in the crew. I’ve never been accepted by Surfer magazine, Surfing magazine, never even by Eastern Surf magazine.” 

“I’ve never been given props.”

“That’s something I’ve had to deal with my whole life.”

“(Rejection) formed me into the person I am today. I am a self-made person. I started that way and I’ll probably end that way.” 

Oh I miss his vibrating little laugh.

Now, is this a heartbreaking story of rejection from the highest office in the land or is Gravy a cry-baby who needs a damn good seeing to with an NYPD flashlight?