ORIGINS: Hornsby, NSW
GENRE: Hardcore
YEARS ACTIVE: 1995-2000, 2003, 2009-2012, 2025
MEMBERS:
RELEASES:
- (Don't) Do the Locomotion (1999) - Split with Fistfull - Download Here.
- 1. Dead Again
- 2. Doomed
- 3. No Retreat No Surrender
- 4. Nintendo Theme Song
- 5. My Story
- 6. Fierce
- I Suggest We Don't Fuck Around (2002)
- 1. Deus Ex Machina (not featured on the remastered version)
- 2. I Could Not Name
- 3. Protective Parent
- 4. No Retreat No Surrender
- 5. Doomed
- 6. Mr De Giorgio.
- 7. My Story
- 8. Dead Again
- 9. Anti-Jason Whethers Project (not featured on remastered version)
- 10. Fierce
- 11. Nintendo Theme Song (not featured on remastered version)
- 12. Schoolyard Graveyard
- Artificial Suns (2011)
- 1. Reset!
- 2. Doomed
- 3. Female
- 4. Hell's Gates
- 5. No Retreat No Surrender
- 6. Artificial Suns
- 7. My Story
- 8. In My Room
- 9. Fierce
- 10. Bladerunner
- I Suggest We Don't Fuck Around - Remastered (2021)
- 1. I Could Not Name
- 2. Protective Parent
- 3. Schoolyard Graveyard
- 4. No Retreat No Surrender
- 5. Fierce
- 6. Doomed
- 7. Mr De Giorgio
- 8. Dead Again
- 9. My Story
- 10. Artificial Suns (Acoustic) (Not featured on original version)
- 11. Doomed (Feelings of Duty Remix) (Not featured on original version)
- 12. Anarchy in the U.K. (Live at the Red Rattler) (Not featured on original version)
- 13. My Story (Excellent Edition) (Not featured on original version)
- 14. Sugartrain (Not featured on original version)
SUMMARY: Nintendo Police were a Hornsby-based hardcore band that formed in the mid-90s during high school. Inspired by bands such as Bad Brains, MDC, DRI, Beastie Boys, and also citing 'skateboarding in shopping centre carparks' as one of their major influences, Nintendo Police were very much a documentation of suburban angst and other teenager experiences. The band settled into their 'classic' lineup of Dave Seet, Shogun, Ward, and Ari in the late '90s before members moved on to other projects in 2000. Reforming for the odd reunion show, the band returned more seriously in 2009 with a new album and a second run before finally calling it quits in 2012. Bassist David Ward later passed away in 2015.
SHOWS:
- Jack's Island Cafe, Hornsby - unknown date, 1996
- House Party, Jay's House - 6th February, 1999
- PCYC, Hornsby - 20th February, 1999
- Scout Hall, Petersham - 27th February, 1999
- Lane Cove Youth Centre, Lane Cove - 17th December, 1999
- Community Centre, Pennant Hills - 8th July, 2000
- PCYC, Hornsby - 30th August, 2003
- Sandringham Hotel, Newtown - 14th October, 2006
- Sandringham Hotel, Newtown - 18th May, 2007
- Red Rattler Theatre, Marrickville - 14th January, 2012
- Moshpit, Erskineville - 26th July, 2025
ORAL HISTORY:
SHOGUN: I used to play a little '80s Casio at my nan's house. It had angel voices and stuff. I would sit there for hours making them sing and talk to each other. I would get lost in their world. I realised you could tell stories with sound and that music made time, temporality, existence itself more beautiful.
Tim 'Shogun' Wall (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE: Nintendo Police started with me and Shogun after we reconnected in high school... It was our first serious band. Shogun and I went to the same primary school. He's my oldest mate actually. In 1995 or 1996, we were both finding our way out of self-pitying grunge and exploring the anger of punk and pride of hardcore. Shogun played guitar and I played bass so it went from there. We had grandiose ideas about what hardcore could be and it was our ideas and my conversations with Shogun that I remember most about the early days. We wanted to tell stories about our strange suburban plight and make music that was theatrical but hardcore. I'm not sure we achieved that, but that was the intention. We were listening to FYP, early DRI, 7 Seconds... some of the older kids at school would pass these tapes onto us and we'd make copies of copies and pass them around our friends. That's how we discovered a lot of hardcore punk.
Dave Seet (Vocals, Bass), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
SHOGUN:
We were super young and nervous and not that cool - but also passionate
and diabolically obsessed! They were the best times. All the nasty, sad
hard drug shit and mental health disasters came about 5 years later.
Those were the salad days for sure. We were straight edge as a reaction
against what a lot of other teenagers in Hornsby were up to in those
days. I was hanging out with kids who were into the standard mid-'90s
assortment of Primus, Mr Bungle, Sonic Youth, etc. Some bands I really
dug, like Sonic Youth... but when we were about 14 that scene turned
pretty druggy and it just wasn't me. I felt too unstable, like I was
already holding back a subconsc ious tidal wave of mentalness that was
pressing at me every day. Plus it was all just so abstract and wacky,
that '90s Mr Bungle clown-core trip. It seemed to have no bearing on
reality. I wanted something more harsh and real because I could already
tell society sucked and I was feeling angry. Not clowny, hahaha.
Tim 'Shogun' Wall (Guitar),
Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE: Tim and I were so excited about the band that we'd talk on the phone for hours many nights discussing the direction we wanted to head, ideas, lyrics, and all the things we wanted to do. It was really exciting and there was urgency and momentum about what we were doing. We were gonna pull Pennant Hills' pants down.
Dave Seet (Vocals, Bass), Screaming Bloody Mess, 2003
SHOGUN: Dave went to a different high school to me so we were somewhat estranged for a year or so, going in different musical and social directions. Whilst I knew very little about punk music, he was all over it by the time we were reunited. I remember walking up his driveway for the first time since primary school and hearing the bass line from Black Flag's 'TV Party' booming out of his bedroom window. Hearing that dodgy, dark and busted-ass bass tone for the first time was such a turning point. Music didn't have to be slick like Primus or Metallica. In fact - and this was revelatory - it was better if it was broken, distorted and trashed. Needless to say, I immediately threw all my Primus, Sonic Youth, and You Am I in the bin. For the remainder of my high school years it was nothing but skateboarding and hardcore music. Everything else, the grunge and shitty early nu-metal that dominated the suburbs, was a total joke to us. Punk was the only way - the real deal. It made all those other genres seem like lame party-clown entertainment for children.
Tim 'Shogun' Wall (Guitar),
Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
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From Counter Attack Issue 4, 1999
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DAVE: Looking back we were so passionate about what we were doing... we really believed in it like a religion. We felt we had something so special and unique to give to the world, and I still think we did, although the final product was always clumsy. But we put so much love and care into those songs, each one took an age to write, probably too long actually. The other thing about Nintendo Police that's maybe alluded to sometimes in our songs is that we would laugh and laugh about everything. At that age, when you're first finding yourself, and first finding out that all the shit you've been taught so far is bullshit, you start to rebel. And the way we rebelled was by laughing at everything as we rolled around the 'burbs on our skateboards. We had a great time. That's why punk suited us; it was just perfect for that time of our lives.
Dave Seet (Vocals, Bass), Duderocket, 2008
GABY: Dave, Tim and I were in Year 9 back then. Tim and Dave were childhood friends from primary school. We were all heavily into music. They started getting into punk bands, then hardcore bands, and were always feeding me tapes to listen to. It was a really good education in hindsight. I just liked playing music in general and had been learning piano for a long time at that point. That led to having a go at guitar, bass, and drums. I think I was the only person they knew at the time who could sort of play drums, or even had drums... I'd played drums for my old cousin's band at his Year 11 formal. We played Oasis, Nirvana, and Tumbleweed covers. I had to go home straight after we played because I was a lowly Year 9er... anyway, I think Tim and Dave just kept asking me until I said yes. It was all very new and exciting at the time.
Gabrielle De Giorgio (Bass, Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE: Gaby joined on drums. She was my girlfriend at the time and we went to the same school. The band's first practice was in my parents' lounge room. I remember practicing for our first show there. We got that first show very early, before we even had a set, so we filled it up with covers and other junk. 'Egg Raid on Mojo' by the Beastie Boys was one of the songs. It was at Jack's Island Cafe, right next to Hornsby Station. Heaps of goofy punk and alternative bands played there in the '90s.
Dave Seet, Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
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Shogun and Dave at the first show, 1996, Jack's Island Cafe.
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GABY: Our very first show was the most significant. It was at Jack's Island Cafe in 1996; a tiny little venue in Hornsby. We'd just rehearsed at Dave's house earlier that day and we were kind of nervous. I think his dad drove us there. The stage was in the corner of the room and propped up by milk crates. Our setlist had a few of the earliest Nintendo songs and some FYP and early Beastie Boys covers. I remember seeing kids jumping up and down to the music we were playing for the first time ever, and it was something you can't forget.
Gabrielle De Giorgio (Bass, Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE: When I first started going to shows the hardcore scene was microscopic. It was really just a few handfuls of people and we all knew each other's business. Back then Resist Records was a skateboard shop on King Street and tours from overseas hardcore bands were next to non-existent. Amongst our friends a few bands were formed - Nintendo Police, S. Van, Worse Off, Meataxe... We lived in and around Hornsby, and some of our friends put on regular shows at Hornsby PCYC so this is how we were labelled for convenience. There wasn't a Hornsby scene as such, it was just the same people travelling up and down the train line going to these shows from Wollongong to Sydney to Newcastle. It certainly wasn't trendy to be into hardcore like it it today. Growing up in that environment at that time I felt blessed. I felt like I was part of something special, and secret even.
Dave Seet (Vocals, Bass), Duderocket, 2008
CAMPBELL: I went to the same school as Shogun but we were in different circles of friends. One thing we had in common was rock 'n' roll and the band said they were looking for a drummer so I put my hand up! I played a couple of shows. I think my first show with the band was a shitty house party or something. We were still really young and it was so hard to get around and do stuff, so the shows were just local stuff.
Campbell Troy (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE:
'Nintendo Police' is a name without a meaning. Really, we thought the
two words sounded cool together. It makes me think of a possible future,
something sinister and Orwellian hidden behind a silly name.
Dave Seet (Vocals, Bass), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE: The bassist we have now is Gabby. She was our drummer but her parents stole her from us. So we tried a long series of druggo drummers. And then we got Gab back again and Campbell was okay for drums, for awhile. Then we had the HSC and shit so we ended up having a heaps long break.
Dave Seet (Vocals, Bass), Counter Attack Issue 4, 1999
GABY:
I went through stages of being in and out of the band towards the end. I
was on bass at that stage. Then I went to uni and sort of lost touch
with Tim and Dave for about ten years.
Gabrielle De Giorgio (Bass, Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
ROCKY: I'd been friends with Shogun since we were about 8 years old. We played guitar together around the age of 13 or 14. We shared a lot of music together... he had a record player and had Circle Jerks, Teenage Electric... I stole Black Sabbath Vol. 4 off him for years. I joined on bass and I remember rocking up to band rehearsal with a bunch of straight c_nts and putting my six pack of beer on my bass amp and thinking: this is how I roll. Whatever.
Nathan 'Rocky' Baker (Bass), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE: We recorded the
(Don't) Do the Locomotion demo tape on an 8 track at Shogun's parents' place in 1999. It was a split demo with our North Shore friends,
Fistfull.
Dave Seet,
Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE:
The song 'My Story' is about being a teenager. It's actually about one
kid who I made up a story about, and he doesn't feel like he's human
anymore. He just looks around and he doesn't fit in or belong anymore.
He's changed and he's turning into a demon, like out of this world, but
he's walking around on earth... the song's just meant to be applicable
to anyone. Like I mean, walking around uni I sometimes find it hard to
believe that I belong to that society because I feel so different. I
think heaps of kids might feel that way.
Dave Seet (Vocals, Bass), Counter Attack Issue 4, 1999
CAMPBELL: I'm pretty sure we recorded at Dave's house in Pennant Hills. I moved on from the band after this because we were just moving in different directions after high school. Instead of moving into the city I went to uni and then went to Japan.
Campbell Troy (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE: Gaby moved to bass before she left the band a while later and was replaced by Ward. He was filling in regularly on bass from early on so he was always a part of the band in a way, and was definitely a full time member when we reformed in the late '00s. For many years during the band's run we rotated through a bunch of very frustrating drummers and never settled until Ari joined. They were kids younger than us but it never progressed beyond rehearsals. One guy was Keith, and I think another guy's name was Chris. I remember sitting outside Keith's house on the kerb with Shogun. We were meant to practice but Keith was asleep inside and we couldn't wake him up, or maybe he was hiding. That was a low point.
Dave Seet, Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
ARI:
I started mainly as a fanboy of Nintendo Police. They were this strange
unique hardcore band who play a show very rarely. Their demo recording
was kicking around and it was so awesome. I eventually made friends with
them and their group of friends. Dave ended up joining my other band on
the bass and we released a demo tape with those Nintendo Police
recordings on one side. They lost their drummer at some point so I
pretty much begged them to let me join even though I was only a beginner
on the drums. I think I played my first gig with them at Lane Cove
Youth Centre in 1999 or 2000. It was a baptism of fire for me and I was
shitting my pants with nerves but it ended up okay. Over the next year
or so I kind of figured out the drums and it ended up pretty sweet.
Ari Rintala (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE: If the internet existed it had only just started up and it was too slow for anyone to put to good use, so everything had to be discovered. We had to hike into the city to do a tour of the record stores to find new music. Mum and Dad would pay expensive postage for hoodies mail-ordered from the US. We passed around tapes and on the rare occasion someone would get their hands on a VHS. Skating was a big part of it too, it made us intimate with our suburban landscape... the schools, the car parks, the library steps... While our peers disappeared into night clubs or drove off in cars, we remained close to the ground. Hardcore also set us aside from what other bands in our area were playing, which was mostly alternative, punk rock, or ska. So it felt like we were creating something new. Hardcore was urgent and self-righteous and it gave us purpose. There was a sad side to it as well though. Amongst our crew, the self-righteousness was a poison. There was mischief, recklessness, and bullying. Rivalries that turned into fights. A lot of energy was wasted and when our innocence was lost there was alcohol and drugs.
Dave Seet, Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
ARI: After I joined we played more often. Perhaps because the Hornsby PCYC scene started to grow and more and more DIY shows were put on there. It probably only lasted about a year before the band had done its thing.
Ari Rintala (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE:
We played fairly regularly but it never seemed like enough when you're a
kid with limitless time. We played the Hornsby PCYC shows a lot,
Sandringham Hotel, and other Inner West venues. We played a lot of
parties as well... We were only teenagers and had recently started going
to hardcore shows. There was some kind of altercation between Craig
Edge (The Blurters) and my friends outside of an all ages show at
Newtown PCYC. Now Craig was older than us, an adult, and much bigger
than any of us, and he was being aggressive. I think Dan from
The Pact
was in the middle of it trying to maintain the peace. When we turned up
at the next show, expecting Craig to be there, we brought a baseball bat
for self defence. It didn't literally have Craig Edge's name on it. We
also didn't use it but it didn't go unnoticed, of course, and we
received plenty of feedback in zines about it. We were kids and it was
an immature thing to do. I can't remember how the conflict started but I
felt then that Craig was in the wrong and he was the aggressor. For
sure he was an arsehole then, that could be true, but we were arseholes
too, so maybe we were at fault or should take at least some of the
blame.
Dave Seet, Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
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DAVE: We did heaps of covers 'cause Shogun is the man of many covers, he is a shogun and jumps around from cover to cover. Shogun you are heaps indecisive... He'll pick a cover, and he'll go "Let's just do some other cover, hey let's cover this and that" and by the end of it I'd go "yeah yeah" 'cause I couldn't be bothered anymore. So I just let Shogun run wild. We did 'We're Gonna Fight' by 7 Seconds, 'Banned in DC' by Bad Brains. We were gonna have a new cover every show but we never got around to playing that many shows.
Dave Seet (Vocals, Bass), Counter Attack Issue 4, 1999
SHOGUN: We were obsessed with Bowie because he was the polar opposite of hardcore and every we were. I sang a cover of Ziggy Stardust when Nintendo Police supported Shank at their All Ages show in 2000. I remember we did a Misfits cover at another venue, a little hall beneath Pennant Hills Library, just down the road from my house. It was amazing to see all these amazing bands I used to travel hours to see, and it was at the bottom of my street!
Tim 'Shogun' Wall (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
ARI: There was a show where Dave was wearing footy shorts and had a
ratstail, he looked like Kostya Tszyu. I think it was the All Ages
Hardcore Superbowl at Pennant Hills Youth Centre. Then there was one gig
we played at Hornsby PCYC, we played a couple of Misfits songs with
Shogun singing and the audience became notably aroused by his crooning.
Ari Rintala (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE: The Violent Hornsby Straightedge compilation on Snapshot Records - the name for that was intended as a joke. It started at a show Nintendo Police played at The Student Prince Hotel with some punk and grind bands. Towards the end, a drunk punk lost his shit and was trashing the joint. Maybe there were more people involved but I remember one punk specifically who was acting crazy, throwing chairs and stuff. At some point the aggression was directed at us. I remember being in the alley outside and Julian from Straight to a Tomb was arming himself with the steering lock from his car. We ended up getting the blame and the label 'Violent Hornsby Straightedge' was used in a zine reporting on the incident, so we adopted said label. Regardless of the specifics of that situation, it is true that around that time our lives were violent and at times we were bullies and aggressors. I regret that. And people were justified in calling us out. I actually think about it quite a bit and it weighs heavily because it's so at odds with how I choose to live now and what I want for others.
Dave Seet (Vocals, Bass), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE:
Shogun was wanting to do something different, so he left and formed Dot
Dot Dot. We agreed to record our songs before we finished up, and that
became I Suggest We Don't Fuck Around, which was released in
2000. We remastered this album recently and it sounds fractionally
better. We didn't do a final show at the time; it felt like it was
already over and were just going through with the administrative task of
documenting the songs. Afterwards, Ari also went on to form Worse Off
and Zen Demon. Both are incredible... I was fortunate to collaborate
with such talented people.
Dave Seet (Vocals, Bass), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
ARI: I Suggest We Don't Fuck Around almost didn't happen because Shogun flat-out refused to record it at first. Our friend Luke Logemann was starting a record label and wanted to release a Nintendo Police record. Dave and I were keen and had started hatching plans for it. When Shogun refused we were furious. He was satisfied that Nintendo Police was a thing of the past and that his new group Dot Dot Dot was where he was focused. We did convince him to come to a rehearsal but he pooh-poohed the whole thing by playing horrendous black metal riffs over everything and not cooperating. Later that evening, me and Dave delivered a little package to his house as a thank you. I won't go into the details of what we delivered because on reflecting it was mean as fuck and I regret it. A few days later I saw Shogun at Pennant Hills station and he yelled something at me from the other platform, "Something something you fat fuck" and flew a karate kick randomly in the air. I walked over to the other platform mainly to apologise. It de-escalated pretty quickly and he eventually agreed to do the recording.
Ari Rintala (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
SHOGUN: I wasn't straightedge anymore and I was becoming a little more, how do you say... bohemian, haha (a wanker? Possibly). Like I was getting into Japanese noise, hyper-technical death metal, stuff like that. My young mind was ravenous for the weirdest thing possible. Meanwhile I felt like the other guys were going a bit more straight down the line or like getting more into Madball, hip-hop, more of a tuff guy vibe. Anyway, I told them I wanted to leave the band or take it in a different direction. I can't remember which but it didn't go that well - they left a cassette tape full of dog shit labelled 'black metal in my letter box. At least I think it was dog shit. Faeces was often weaponised in the '90s! I think it's funny now - we were 19! I still love those dudes heaps.
Tim 'Shogun' Wall (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
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Shogun, Luke Logemann, Dave Seet
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LUKE: Ironically titled I Suggest We Don't Fuck Around, it's been nearly a year since we decided to do the record on Set Fire To My Home Records. Me, Dave and Shogun had to drive out to the quaint Baulkham Hills home of a strange character named 'Ian McKaye from ACDC' to hand over the final goods and organise the pressing... "So what's the album called?" Dave says, "Um, it's got a swear word in it"... He says the name and the guy starts writing it. As soon as he gets to the F we both burst out laughing with red faces and couldn't stop giggling.
Luke Logemann, Set Fire to My Home Issue 2, 2002
ARI: The recording was okay. It was recorded at a weird suburban studio owned and run by some turbo Christian guy. We liked the material and had some new songs written specifically for the record like 'Anti-Jason Wethers Project' and 'Schoolyard Graveyard', among others. The gear we used was terrible. Shogun's amp was the size of a shoebox and my drum kit was a real piece of shit, with many parts borrowed from other pieces of shit drum kits. Shogun played the guitar and bass on that record, probably through the same toaster-sized amp.
Ari Rintala (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
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Review by Steve Igloo, Pee Zine Issue 29, 2004
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REVIEW: Sydney's Nintendo Police have whipped up 12 tracks and put 'em down, short 'n' sweet, 22 minutes all up. That's the short bit, and the sweet bit...? Fast thrash punk is the sound. Makes for a welcome change to some of the shit coming out nowadays. They suggest you don't fuck around, and they don't either - no fuckin' round with song structures, choruses and verses, they just say and play what they've got to, then it's over. Highlights are 'I Could Not Name', 'Mr D', 'Anti-Jason Whethers Project' and 'Nintendo Theme Song'.
Review of I Suggest We Don't Fuck Around by Brad 'Bomber' Moore, Bombshellzine, 2002
DAVE:
After Shogun left the band I tried to reinvent Nintendo Police with a
new line up and new songs. I think we had one rehearsal at my parents'
place. There was Ari, Eli from Stockholm Syndrome (or Luke Phillips, I
can't remember) and Jonny of Chinese Burns Unit/Hellebores. We were
trying to do something heavy and progressive and I was attracted to the
idea of reinvention, but ironically I was holding onto the past by
insisting we keep the band name.
Dave Seet, Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
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Counter Attack Issue 4, c. 1999
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DAVE:
It came to a point where our interests had diverged and we were all
ready to try something new. The reasons we had for starting the band
weren't there any more, and I guess what the band represented had become
redundant as an outlet for us. I would like to have annoyed more people
during our lifetime... We've played a few shows since we disbanded in
2000, but most of them have been in lounge rooms and backyards at
parties.
Dave Seet (Vocals, Bass), Screaming Bloody Mess, 2003
ARI: As far as I'm concerned the band never broke up. There were a couple of occasions where we would whip it out at a party or randomly play a gig after the band had been inactive for a couple of years.
Ari Rintala (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE: Later, in the late '00s, we would hang out at Ward's place a lot and one of us wrote a song and then came another and another. Once we had a few new songs it felt right to find a gig. It was a fun and easy thing to do. Especially because everything about the previous band, Baltic [which featured Dave, Shogun, and Ari], had seemed so hard - it was easy to be making hardcore again. I was concerned about using the 'Nintendo' band name again at the time, since so much about music now was happening online. I also liked the idea of reinventing ourselves, like Prince or Kanye. If Nintendo Police was a possible future, then N-Police would be a future future.
Dave Seet, Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
SHOGUN: We'd all been developing a lot musically in the 2000s-era bands we'd done subsequent to Nintendo Police and we missed playing together and it was like: why not? We wanted to write new stuff that was like a hyper-modern development of our sound. We were all still friends, still hanging out and doing the same shit (if not worse, haha) and there was an exciting new wave of bands that we liked and wanted to play with too. Music in Sydney was becoming super-creative and exciting at that time with bands like Circle Pit, The Disbelievers, etc. It was maybe two years before I joined Royal Headache.
Tim 'Shogun' Wall (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE: N-Police started recording in 2009 and released the album in 2011. We'd play a show every now and then, it was actually more like a reunion each time we played, rather than reformation. Artificial Suns... I think it keeps our original spirit, but the bitterness we accumulated since is apparent too. The newer songs touch the boundary of what hardcore can be, like if David Bowie started a hardcore band, what might that sound like? And all the old songs on there were lovingly given a power-up, an animism they didn't have before. Hardcore is unapologetically traditional. It's all about being true to an original form, which is great, I love that. But it does create room to try something new and for hardcore to not take itself too seriously. We definitely let other influences infiltrate the music on Artificial Suns, whether that was Bowie, cock rock, or indie stuff. I'm quite proud of this collection of songs. And the album's cover art was a painting by Ward. This is very special to us, after he passed away in 2014.
Dave Seet, Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
ARI: There was a time around 2009 where we played quite a few times and even recorded a record. Some of those shows did go off from memory. To this day my opinion is that we have never broken up as a band, it just fizzled out as people stopped asking us to play.
Ari Rintala (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE: We did one show in Melbourne towards the end of when the band reformed. Royal Headache were playing and Shogun managed to get us on the bill. Royal Headache were starting to blow up at the time so it was one of the biggest crowds we'd had and we were older so we actually had decent equipment - a big difference after playing in empty community centre halls for years with tiny practice amps.
Dave Seet, Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DAVE: After our show at the Red Rattler in Marrickville I got shitty at some of the guys for not pulling their weight, so I told them I wasn't doing it anymore. I should add, although I didn't fully realise it at the time, I don't think Shogun was well. So there were various forces pulling us apart.
Dave Seet, Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
ARI: I love all the songs and I still feel like a Nintendo Police fanboy to this day, even after being in the band for 25 years. If I had to pick my favourite songs I would have to go first of all with 'Dead Again'. It's just so bad arse when the cymbals are counting and Dave goes "Time to draw a breath and die". The first time I heard that I was like "Fuck yeah", chills up the spine. 'No Retreat No Surrender' is another favourite - the opening riff is amazing, to think Shogun dreamt that up when he was a teenager, the dude is a freak you'll see another genius like that in your life time. There's a worthy mention from our later stuff which I loved playing - a dual track called 'Hell's Gates / Hi-Score'. This later stuff was so fun to jam because it was creative and funny.
Ari Rintala (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
SHOGUN:
There's something about one's first-born band that might have a special
magic to it. That first band is a kind of petri-dish project, pretty
much a random group of friends that's more likely to be an important
formative experience rather than something that's polluted by success.
It's usually later bands that have that issue. Nintendo Police are
definitely all still friends, which is nice. I need them in my life.
Tim 'Shogun' Wall (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
RELATED BANDS: Dot Dot Dot, Royal Headache, Antenna, Headless Horsemen, Baltic, Worse Off, Coward, Zen Demon, King Kong, Lord, The Forgotten Army,
Meataxe,
S. Van,
Bad Skate Unit, This Is, Iron Sausage, Shogun and the Sheets, Badlands, Gorebash, Finnogun's Wake,
Fistfull,
Arkanoid, Burning Servant, Convict,
S-Tribe, Hypnotoad, Cheapshot,
The Trashtones, Zond, Brand Loyalty, Low Life, Hearse Chasers, Three Found Dead
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