The Peep Tempel Live @ Crowbar: Visceral, Funny and Loud as Hell
- Ben Preece
- 6 days ago
- 4 min read
The Peep Tempel @ Crowbar, Brisbane — 4 October 2025
Live Review by Ben Preece
Photos by Alec Smart
It’s a strange and beautiful sight to see The Peep Tempel draw such a cross-section of humanity. There are old bald men clutching schooners and yelling lyrics like it’s still 2014, and there are quite a lot of women throwing elbows in equal measure up front. Where do they come from? Maybe word’s travelled that few bands in this country can summon chaos so controlled, or joy so feral.
The night opens with Eyes Ninety, a band that sounds like they’ve crawled straight out of a sticky-floored rehearsal room in 1983 and never once looked back. Raw, ragged and gloriously unrefined, they tear through their set with a kind of noisy sincerity that makes you forget they’re the openers. The frontman swaps between guitar and saxophone several times, and when that horn comes out, it honks like a deranged car alarm in the best possible way. At one point the second guitarist takes over lead vocals for three songs, each one dirtier and more deranged than the last. By the end, they’ve well and truly warmed the room — no small feat for the first band of the night.
GIMMY follows, and the tone shifts immediately. The Brisbane-based songwriter fronts a sharp four-piece that blends indie-rock with streaks of new-wave and garage grit. Her songs from the debut Things Look Different Now sound fuller, heavier and more lived-in live. GIMMY’s vibrato vocals cut through the mix with conviction; her stage presence is pure magnetism — the kind of performer who commands attention without demanding it. It’s a raw, authentic set that reminds everyone that indie rock still has something to say.
When The Peep Tempel finally appear one by one, Crowbar erupts. The first chord of ‘People Don’t Get You’ chimes out — an easy start, not by most bands’ standards, but by the rest of this set’s. From the opening riff of ‘Lance’, it’s all testosterone-fuelled muscle and menace — wiry riffs, shouted harmonies, and that trademark sneer from Blake Scott that’s somehow both funny and furious. They play like a band with nothing left to prove and no interest in pretending otherwise — and the crowd responds accordingly.
The room becomes a living organism: bodies shifting, circle pits forming, voices colliding, pints flying everywhere. Every song feels like a riot barely contained by rhythm. The band lock in tight — guitar, bass, drums — with that telepathic precision that only comes from years of sweating it out together as a power trio. Scott’s vocals snarl and smirk in equal measure, his phrasing as jagged and human as ever. Between songs, he compliments us on our now-drinkable tap water and warns of the perils of heading into the Valley after the show — possibly encountering the kind of thick-necked rugby bloke that only exists in Brisbane.
Whether played up or natural, he possesses an outrageous Aussie accent that somehow channels the likes of Ian Dury or John Lydon with Alf Stewart mixed in simultaneously. But when your band is this compelling and rocks this hard, who really cares? It’s visceral, funny, and reverent in all the right ways — full of sensory grit and that dry Aussie wit that The Peep Tempel thrive on.
Drummer Steven Carter rips through mostly four-to-the-floor chaos, laying the foundation with tireless energy. He doesn’t sit still all night — his role is as hectic as it gets for any drummer, and he doesn’t miss a single beat. Bassist Stewart Rayner, ever the solid anchor, holds his own stoic cool throughout, while Scott remains the consummate loose frontman — unpredictable, magnetic, and absolutely in command.
‘Neuroplasticity’ and ‘Big Fish’ cop the loudest cheers early in the set, but the selection overall is curious. It pulls equally from their self-titled debut and third album Joy. Interesting, given they’re celebrating ten years of their second-album breakthrough Tales, yet only lift a small handful from it. When someone shouts for ‘Vicki the Butcher’, Scott laughs and admits he doesn’t remember how to play it anymore. But of course, it’s ‘Carol’ that rouses the loudest roar — a room-wide chant of “I don’t think Trevor is good for you / I don’t think Trevor is good for you.” Poor old Trevor, up the front on the edge of the circle pit, doesn’t know where to look.
“We don’t do encores ’cause I reckon they’re naff,” Scott grins as he begins to wind things up. The night is messy, loud, and glorious — and as the final notes of 'Down At The Peep Tempel' and 'Kalgoorlie' ring out, it’s hard to shake the thought that The Peep Tempel remain one of the most vital live acts this country’s ever produced.
It’s true. They play songs, they conjure a feeling, they start a party, they become your best mates. The albums are good — but live, they’re something else entirely: raw, ridiculous, and completely alive. Tonight, they don’t perform nostalgia. They detonate it.
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