NAARM/MELBOURNE GROUP ROLLER ONE RETURN WITH ‘SO FAR’,
THE FIRST SINGLE FROM THEIR FORTHCOMING NEW ALBUM.
It’s been seven years since Melbourne band Roller One released their third album, Better Than Fine. A pandemic got in the way of life and art in those intervening years, but the good news for fans of dark alt-country and electric acid folk is that the quartet are back with ‘So Far’, the captivating first single from their new album, Fate Done Nice.

In the past, the band— based around Fergus McAlpin and Adam Affif—has been compared to Hank Williams, Townes Van Zandt, Johnny Cash, Don Walker, and Gram Parsons. Add to that list Bill Callahan, Lambchop, and Giant Sand, and you get a real sense of a band operating right across the arc of country and folk music, from the instigators to the modern-day alt-country and Americana progenitors who place the music in contemporary settings, with poetry, atmosphere, and eloquence.

McAlpin and Afiff reunite with their ex-Silver City Highway band mates Simon Edwards (drums) and NIck Hurle (pianos), with additional contributions from Georgia Knight on vocals and Cahill Kelly on guitar. The result is more electrically charged, with drive and energy, whilst still retaining the band’s organic warmth and sound.

On ‘So Far’, the guitars chug with a persistent groove, like prime-era Smog, as Hurle’s piano unfurls across the song and McAlpin sings ‘sometime I wander, and get lost a little, and end up far away’, exploring the dichotomy of distraction versus attraction, with nuance and grace.

Roller One offers a unique blend of introspective songwriting, sparse instrumentation, and emotionally resonant delivery, as evidenced by this superb first taste of their forthcoming new album, on Cheersquad Records & Tapes.