ORIGINS: Sydney, NSW
GENRE: Hardcore / Powerviolence
YEARS ACTIVE: 2003-2007
MEMBERS:
- Troy 'Teeroy' Harrison - Vocals
- James 'Butterball' Giddins - Bass
- Micko Lemur - Drums
- Daniel 'Dano' Ryan - Guitar
- Paul 'Shirker' Mernagh - Vocals (2003-2004)
- Simon 'Simmo' Slaughter / de Gersigny - Vocals (2005-2007)
- Chris 'Beer' Foye - Guitar (2003-2004)
- Mitchel Pangas - Guitar (2005-2006)
RELEASES:
- Self-Titled (2004) - Download Here.
- 1. Sit Down, Shut Up
- 2. XHumpty DumptyX
- 3. A/S/L
- 4. WWF Rematch at the Cow Palace (Spazz cover)
- 5. C.L.A. (Spazz cover)
- 6. Shit Talking
- 7. Ask Our Band Manager (Alt F4)
- 8. Individualised Floorpuncher (Charles Bronson cover)
- 9. ...
- Queensland Tour EP (2005) [split with The New Justice Team] - Download Here.
- 1. A/S/L
- 2. Shit Talking
- 3. Sit Down, Shut Up
- 4. Alt F4 (Ask Our Manager)
- The Crash That Ended in 'E' (2006) [split with Frank Rizzo] - Download Here.
- 1. Plz Add Me to ICQ
- 2. Rock 'N' Roll Substance Abuse Program
- 3. Pan-Fried Tyrant
- 4. Morphed Daze
- 5. Blood to Floor
- 6. + Hardcaw
- The Lost Album (2007)
- 1. Falconio
- 2. The Black Sheep
- 3. Coma 84
- 4. Ballworker
- 5. Alt F4
- 6. Landslide
- 7. The Beginning
- 8. Harakiri
- 9. Pan-Fried Tyrant
- 10. Catching the Red Eye
SUMMARY: ROFL began as a jam session that formed out of the ashes of the band The Panic Attacks. Evolving to incorporate two vocalists, original singer Paul Mernagh moved on just prior to the band's 2005 Brisbane tour with The New Justice Team and was replaced by Simon 'Simmo' Slaughter. ROFL chaotically spilled across the stage of various venues for another three years before members decided to call it a day after the departure of founding guitarist Dano. Just prior to this the band recorded an album that was to never see release - the masters were lost until Simon found them again in 2024.
SHOWS:
- PCYC, Penrith - 8th October, 2004
- The Harp, Tempe - 29th October, 2004
- House Party, Redfern - 30th October, 2004
- National Beer Day, Putty - 6th November, 2004
- Arncliffe Hotel, Arncliffe - 26th March, 2005
- Newcastle Leagues Club, Newcastle - 30th April, 2005
- The Clubhouse, Glebe - 17th June, 2005
- Arncliffe Hotel, Arncliffe - 24th June, 2005
- Ahimsa House, Brisbane - 2nd September, 2005
- BBQ, House Party, Brisbane - 3rd September, 2005
- The Orient, Brisbane - 3rd September, 2005
- House Party, Enmore - 15th September, 2006
- 22, Newtown - 4th February, 2006
- Bar Broadway, Sydney - 24th February, 2006
- The Lucky Country, Newcastle - 19th May, 2006
- Punx Picnic, Sydney Park, St Peters - 19th August, 2006
- The Pitz, Marrickville - 25th March, 2007
- Sandringham Hotel, Newtown - 18th May, 2007
- Sandringham Hotel, Newtown - 3rd June, 2007
ORAL HISTORY:
MICKO: ROFL started after three differently-named bands didn't work out and it needed its own things. Originally I'd started a band with Luke and Paul Shirker called ADD Thrash in 2001, which was a bass-less power violence band with Western Sydney pop hooks. Luke left in late 2001 so that was it for that - after one show at Hornsby PCYC. With Paul Shirker, we gathered local legends Jonny Optional (from every band), Knibbsy (from Stereo City fame) and Teeroy (from the Bombshellzine forums), and changed the name to The Panic Attacks. After a few shows, some member changes, and a Geoff Lee classic demo which nobody has heard yet, Jonny and Knibbsy lost interest in mine and Teeroy's desire for power violence/fastcore and we eventually began ROFL.
Micko Lemur (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
PAUL: ROFL was weirdness. I loved it. Micko is a genius and, when surrounded by the right kind of weirdos at the right time, he conjures up magic things. That's how it felt at the start and I felt like we could just be loud, weird, messy and stupid without being dumb if that makes sense.
Paul Mernagh (Vocals), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DANO: The band kinda spawned from being in The Panic Attacks. I'd joined at the tail end of their existence and it was almost all of the members in that band who started ROFL. I think it started with the boys jamming with Chris Beer and working out a few Spazz covers, then deciding to form an actual band, and so I was asked if I wanted in.
Daniel Ryan (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
TROY: I'd watched lots of band shows, and helped put some on. I used to go and see a lot of ska and punk bands when I first started going to shows, then got into hardcore and heavier stuff more. I guess living with the music lover that is Micko helped... he always had some new and interesting music on, and I just love the energy of live shows, and made a bunch of friends in bands too - especially guys like Luke Shirker and Ryan (Mad Dash), who are still best friends. I was watching their bands every week. Went to lots of shows at the Iron Duke. I guess I was never that musical, never really thought about being in a band too much, but then Micko asked if I wanted to sing in a new band he had started so I said, why not? Can't be that hard!
Troy Harrison (Vocals), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
JAMES: ROFL started in my Gordon street house in Burwood. I was lucky enough to have a jam room with drums and amp set up... one day Micko and I started thrashing around, him on drums and me on bass, being stupid, kinda mocking hardcore and speedcore, and it snowballed from there.We then got Chris and Troy involved around the same time.
James Giddins (Bass), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
MICKO: We'd been hanging out a lot at Butterball and Cindy's house in Burwood and would jam a lot there. Local Bombshellzine celebrity Chris Beer lived down the road from the Burwood house and recent Forster import Dano was looking to join a band in Sydney so we started jamming together with Butterball on bass. It began as learning a few Spazz songs in the spare room that I'd usually wake up in every weekend. Paul was still keen so it was to be dual vocal/dual guitar six piece mayhem by idiots that had no idea what they were doing.
Micko Lemur (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
CHRIS: We were just jamming around in Cindy's loungeroom (James's girlfriend) in Gordon Street, Burwood, when I suggested we learn a Spazz song. We learnt it and it sounded amazing so we decided to form a band together and play shows.
Chris Foye (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
PAUL: I got to scream my guts out, which I'd never done before. I found a voice I didn't know I had. But then I lost it for three days after we first jammed, hahaha.
Paul Mernagh (Vocals), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
JAMES: The first few songs were recorded at a pretty nice studio in Surry Hills... Clay (The Brain, Quadbox) was our engineer. We had a four hour session on a Saturday morning. The studio was a fairly high end, and much too nice for us - it had isolated and floating rooms, a couch in the mixing room, the whole deal. I recall Clay had a mesa boogie bass rig set up in the room that he let me borrow. Very nice rig. Probably for the best, as the old Peavey amp I inherited/borrowed/possibly stole, well, it wasn't that great. We were pretty tight and excited to be recording at the time, so we laid the guitars and drum tracks down in quick succession. Probably too much coffee and red bulls for Micko and I. It was all very new too, so things happened very fast... I'm not sure what happened with mastering, I tend to think the 'album' we released was just a mix that Clay gave us at the end of our session. I remember creating the artwork, ripping copies of CDs and all that fun stuff being done completely during work hours on my work computer. The artwork was basically me just goofing around off the back of the whole internet-speak movement and putting something together to complement our ridiculous band name. I basically scoured the internet for images of stereotypical nerds. At the time I had access to a very nice Mac G5 for Photoshop. It was the shit. The G5 was also good for being a pest on the various internet forums, special mention to Bombshell!
James Giddins (Bass), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
MICKO: We recorded a demo and were keen to play some shows. The internet 'theme' of the band came from us being internet nerds, I guess. It was the era of internet where forums were King so Butterball came up with the back cover design for the demo, ripping off Screaming Bloody Mess (another Internet forum. The lyrical themes regarding the internet were, I guess, to brand with the name of the band. But yeah, nah, that's just what we were into.
Micko Lemur (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
JAMES: Our first show could have been at Maggotville... I remember the set being loads of fun and over quickly as were most of our sets. The one memory that sticks is how nervous Chris was, and he had read somewhere that bananas calm nerves, so moments before we went on he was smashing bananas side of stage! Needless to say, bananas didn't help.
James Giddins (Bass), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
MICKO: The first show was a gig I organised via Screaming Bloody Mess at Maggotville in July of 2004. Other bands on the bill were The Collapse from Perth, Stereo City, Altered Beast, and Organ Doner Kebab. I remember Beer being so anxious that he ate about six bananas. We weren't very good but hopefully it was noisy enough to mask the awful playing. The demo helped us do a good range of shows after this though... early on we got to play at the underground army bunkers in Malabar at a hardcore/breakcore/noise night, which was amazing. We also played a harbour cruise and other mad gigs like The Clubhouse in Glebe, Simmo's old house in Surry Hills, Arncliff Hotel, etc. Chris Beer got over it in 2005, as did Paul, so we had to change shit up again.
Micko Lemur (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
PAUL: I wasn't ever really part of the band. I liked most of the guys a lot and considered them friends but I felt a but outside the dynamic collectively. And there was one guy there at the time who I didn't know so well, who I didn't gel with in a way that was important to me to move on from. I had Brand Disloyalty at that point anyway, and lots of other stuff going on. So it was best I made space for somebody else. Great fun for a while though!
Paul Mernagh (Vocals), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
SIMMO:
The band had been around for a while with Paul Shirker on vocals but at
some point he couldn't be fucked anymore. I'd been mates with everyone
for years and perhaps they thought my baby bird squawking would suit the
band, haha. I was in a band called Arkanoid at the time.
Simon Slaughter (Vocals), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
CHRIS: It was fun for six months until things went a bit dark. I left 'cause my heart wasn't it in anymore. Simon then changed the password on the ROFL website and told everyone I had changed it as my way of being spiteful. That was untrue but they all believed it and made some hate songs about me over it. Five years later, Simon confessed to me that he'd made it all up because he was mad at me at the time. It was all a bit of high school really. Still an interesting slice of history.
Chris Foye (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
SIMMO: Oh yeah, I vaguely remember something about that. Someone changed the password, nobody knew what it was so it was all over, haha. Might've been more to it but I can't remember. I didn't have much to do with that shit.
Simon Slaughter (Vocals), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
MITCH: I had known the guys in ROFL from going to gigs and hanging out around the Inner West and all over Sydney. My house mate and best friend from school - Daniel Ryan - was the guitarist and he was very passionate about grindcore and all really heavy fast music. Our musical interests and styles crossed over in many ways. We had a bit of a party house/bachelor pad with lots of different kinds
of artists and musos coming and going on a daily basis. We were known as
the punks by the locals and everyone knew what they were in for when
they came over... the music was always on and up loud. I'd always
enjoyed hardcore and heavier music. Dan kind of got me into grind and
stuff like Dillinger Escape Plan, Pig Destroyer, Converge, and a bunch
of awesome music. Anyway, he asked me to do a couple of gigs and taught me the songs one night in our living room. So I was roped in and had no choice to accept and enjoy playing some grind with a bunch of badass motherfuckers.
Mitchel Pangas (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DANO: ROFL shows were... well... heavily under the influence for sure, very much a party for us every time. I think for me, personally, coming from a small coastal town and not the city, I was living my rock 'n' roll dream, haha, getting ducked up and playing cool shows. We played a lot of shows where we would be the outlier on the bill, either too hardcore for the punk bands or too punk for the metal bands, which would sometimes be a factor in needing to get as smashed as possible before playing (perhaps nerves?). Either way, I would say our shows were a bloody good time with a cool bunch of people. I just wish I could actually remember playing a lot of the cool gigs we played. I would definitely say we would sometimes be menaces to the bands after us, heckling and the like, mainly me and Simmo, due to our 'pre-gig activities'.
Daniel Ryan (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
SIMMO: I'm shit at lyrics so Troy most of them. Dano wrote a couple too. I was recording once, absolutely off my dial, and I was sweating so badly - it was dripping all over Troy's handwritten lyric sheet. He was up my arse to get it right and the words were just smudging everywhere, haha. The lyrics kind of started as piss takes on internet acronyms but it kind of ranged from jeering at band managers, smoking weed, and various other trivial garbage... In terms of coordinating with Troy, we attempted to have a more layered, overlapping vocal arrangement - but it just ended up being you bark, I squeal, you bark, I squeal, etc. So we just figured out which parts we would each prefer to do, and the other would do the next part. If we both wanted to be involved in a certain part, then we just yelled over the top of each other, haha.
Simon Slaughter (Vocals), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
MITCH: I'd joined ROFL just before the Queensland tour and had an absolute blast playing those shows with the boys. I remember the warehouse gig in Brisbane being one of the best crowds I've ever played in front of. Simon and Troy feed off each other's energy and were amazing. Micko played vicious tribal bombasts at warp speed. James fingered the bass like it was the last day on earth and semi-erotically made love to the thing. Dan bled all over his guitar and we all played our hearts out. I couldn't believe how alive the gig was. It was packed out and people were dancing so enthusiastically, it was like a treacherous sea canopy moving around with arms and legs spinning in maelstroms of wildness and pleasure.
Mitchel Pangas (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
JAMES: We did a trip to Brisbane for a weekend of madness. Hazy memories of a wild drive from Sydney. I think we did 3 shows. Some big pub in the city that I think we all got kicked out of afterwards, a popular artsy venue somewhere (which was insane because we started playing just as acid was kicking in), and someone's backyard for a very hungover Sunday afternoon. Somewhere in there we lost our minds when staying at a hostel, on acid, and we might have been kicked out of there too!
James Giddins (Bass), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
MICKO: The Brisbane tour was pretty wild. Teeroy and Luke Holmes (The New Justice Team) made a split CD one night
at their Enmore house to take on the tour. The CD sucks because of the
tracklisting going back and forth between the two bands. Which is cute
if the volume levels were even... geez, what else do you want to do to
poor people's eardrums? Anyway, we played three gigs in about 24 hours and by the end of the last set I couldn't hit the hi-hats. We also played a day show in someone's backyard and there were chickens roaming everywhere. Everyone in ROFL except me were off their dials and hanging onto the clothesline while playing in order to stand upright.
Micko Lemur (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
MITCH: The day show has kept a warm little spot in my memory. It was a vegan BBQ and I was still very high on LSD from the night before and kind of just leaned against a hills hoist clothesline and watched the chickens running around my feet, oblivious that I was actually playing music.
Mitchel Pangas (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
SIMMO:
The show we played with The New Justice Team in Brisbane on the
Saturday night was pretty wild but what actually stands out more in my
memory was the show the next day in someone's backyard. I was so ratshit
I just clung to the clothesline for support, trying not to die. We
basically just sat around in a circle chainsmoking cones the whole show and trying to protect the bowl from the hungry chickens who were very keen to sample the THC-laden flora.
Simon Slaughter (Vocals), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DANO: Some of the best times of that Brisbane tour happened behind the scenes, mainly the acid-fuelled antics at the hostel we stayed in, which seemed to create the theme of the tour with the culmination being the show we played underneath a clothesline in the backyard of someone's house... watching chickens running 'round the people through the clouds of bong smoke. It was our first tour... first and only tour actually, haha, we weren't proactive enough to organise anything beyond that. It was made all the better for having The New Justice Team as tour pals keeping the Sydney camaraderie going amongst the Queenslanders!
Daniel Ryan (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
MITCH: I can't remember the last gig I played with ROFL or why I stopped. I played in a bunch of bands and did little tours before and after ROFL with Dime A Dozen, Talons, Dead China Doll, Bug Blood, Death Claws of the World Unit, etc. Those days and bands and gigs and merging scenes hold great memories.
Mitchel Pangas (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
SIMMO: We played with Mortal Sin at Bar Broadway, which was pretty funny. Actually, I think my favourite memory was playing a Club Blink show at The Agincourt. There was a local bogan band called Thundabox (pronounced 'Fundabox') and they had a song with a chorus that went, "me mates are cunts, me mates are cunts". We used to put that song on for a laugh all the time. And now at this show, we were playing with them! You could imagine our excitement. The Agincourt fucked up and double-booked the downstairs room for a gaggle of Argentinians to watch the World Cup. So we ended up playing right next to the front doors that opened onto George Street in the city. It was sick 'cause there was this crazy mixture of Club Blink gronks, Agincourt soccer fans, and a few people there to actually see the show. There was this extremely well-endowed goth chick there with no top on, just a little sticker to cover each nip. The Muslim security guard was losing his fucking mind and trying to kick her out. So my girlfriend, Emma, cupped her breasts from behind, exclaiming to the security guard that she was a human bra and everything was fine. Dano was trying to get a photo of the hilariousness and the goth chick's girlfriend got very defensive and punched Dano in the head! It was very funny. But then we all got kicked out, despite my protests that we needed to play the gig. Eventually we got the manager to let us back in. During the set I would periodically stroll out the door onto George Street, yelling at passers-by or I would run into the pokie room and scream at cunts having a quiet slap. It was awesome. Then Fundabox came on, and played 'Me mates are cunts', much to our excitement. But that wasn't good enough. So we made them play it again and took all their microphones and sang the song for them, but with Blood Duster-style vocals. Definitely one of my favourite gigs.
Simon Slaughter (Vocals), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
MICKO: We recorded a bunch of songs at Scene Around Sound in Brookvale in 2006 with our new second vocalist Simmo, and seven songs from that are on a split CD with Northern Beaches legends Frank Rizzo. It's very different to the first recording.
Micko Lemur (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
.
JAMES: The second recording was done at Scene Around Sound - shout out to Scotty and the Twin City Faction Crew (you fucking legends). We rehearsed there for a good stint, played a bunch of shows too. Some really fun and messy times. I woke up there once or twice after some big nights, haha. It was peak Sydney punk-hardcore scene days, I guess. The memories of recording and rehearsing all blend into one, haha. The songs were sounding sick, and we were tight as fuck, there was lots of jamming leading up to it. I think we planned the recording over a couple of days. The engineer was Matt, who had a pretty good set up out the back of the studio. We were surprisingly pretty organised and driven at the time; momentum was good. Lots of weed in preparation of course (big ups to Troy for always bringing a bong). Dano wrote such complex riffs and shredded, my bass was a bit out of shape then, so I remember having to bend the neck a little depending on where on the fret board I was, just to keep in tune. Blood thing. Have absolutely no idea where that bass is today. I definitely remember very sore fingers from playing so much.
James Giddins (Bass), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
MICKO: We eventually recorded again in 2007... we are idiots and thought each other had lost it but the master CD was found recently in Simmo's house.
Micko Lemur (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
SIMMO: The very last song we wrote had a line about emo kids following through with their threats and hanging themselves from their sky-blue scarves. We did this final recording before breaking up but it never saw the light of day and the masters were lost. A few months ago, one of my cats was fucking around in the bookshelf, just generally trashing shit in the vain hope of attracting my attention to gift her with a third dinner. And lo and behold, there was a CD that just said 'ROFLMASTER', lying on the ground. Haha, good Norks finding the long-lost ROFL master. It's only been 17 years since we recorded it!
Simon Slaughter (Vocals), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
MICKO: Cam (The New Justice Team) played a show with us at the Sando. Troy was away so it was Simmo and Cam on the floor doing vocals
Micko Lemur (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
SIMMO: It was great... just hanging out with a bunch of good mates, taking drugs every week. We got to play all kinds of venues, with countless sick bands, and met shitloads of awesome people from all walks of life. Playing out of town to a room full of unfamiliar faces would definitely be a highlight for me. And it was all while getting your ego stroked because "you're in a band maaan". Hahaha. I also enjoyed screaming very close to people's faces, they didn't quite know what they were getting themselves into!
Simon Slaughter (Vocals), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
JAMES: Like any band over time, things change and people move on and up. I think the scene in Sydney was dying out a little; fewer gigs, fewer venues, and other bands splitting up. Motivation was probably low and things probably just faded out slowly. No significant event took place to end the band, there was no active decision to stop except for Dano moving to the UK. We did discuss doing some rehearsing in 2010 but I think, in the end, getting us all together in the same room at the same time became harder and harder... and when we were all together it was more about mates catching up, rather than pushing the band along. Or, maybe I will start the rumour that T-roy and Simmo were fighting about a love triangle with a beagle, and punched each other in the face mid-show, and that was the end of that.
James Giddins (Bass), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
DANO: I think ROFL was able to survive for as long as it did because of the fact that we are all actually good friends, and we would hang out regularly outside of doing band things. We would often have nights out and then crash at each other's places. We were all big time bong smokers too, which helped a lot. Probably also our relaxed attitude towards rehearsing and playing, so no real pressure, although that was probably also why our releases are scarce and our tour history is lacklustre! What actually ended the band was my decision to move to the UK.
Daniel Ryan (Guitar), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
MICKO: ROFL finished when Dano moved to England, pretty much. By then I was well over playing drums and was more interested in making hardcore techno on my computer and my radio show anyway. My favourite thing about playing in ROFL was probably the laughter; the ROFLs. Laughing at trying to play so fast that we had to stop and have some billies. Knowing that the only song anyone liked had a Spiderbait riff in it. Servo runs with these idiots after band practice in Brookvale.
Micko Lemur (Drums), Noise Levels correspondence, 2024
RELATED BANDS: ADD Thrash / The Panic Attacks, Dot Dot Dot, Dime A Dozen, Dystempa, Crimespree, Anarchoi, Fallopian Butcher, Joythief, The Divorcee, Indigo Cult, Talons, Dead China Doll, Bug Blood, Death Claws of the World Unit, Arkanoid, Ether Rag, Crisis Cult, Crust Fund Kids, Forakt, Wilbur Wilde, Snitch Trial, The Shirkers, The Spitz, Brand Disloyalty
