Words by Harry Webber June 9, 2023

The POND frontman goes solo (again).

It feels like years of providing us with avant-psych-pop, contorting his body on stages around the country, and repeatedly analysing life through an Aussie lens, has cemented Nicholas Allbrook as one of our greatest musical assets. His conflicted relationship with Australia and our environment (or perhaps our treatment of it) has often formed the grounding of his best work, and with his third solo album Manganese it seems many of those themes are bubbling to the surface once again.

Reflecting on the album title, Allbrook takes us to WA’s mining mecca, Port Hedland in The Pilbara region. “It’s the land of the giants. The trains are as long as entire cities. The trucks have wheels bigger than your house. It’s fucking weird. We were there doing a project with some crew from Nyamal and Nyangumarta nations. And this old woman called Auntie Tina – English is her fourth language – pointed out this giant pile of manganese and said: ‘See that? That’s my manganese.’”

“So the album is a nod to the environmental, but it’s more about the personal aspect of being in places like this and having the soul ripped out of a land. It’s about trying to challenge the Australian tendency to pretend nothing’s wrong while things worsen. But it’s also about the young men and women from around the world – Australia, Ireland, England, China – who end up in that place. Sacrificing their souls, basically, for this project.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOAMp0SqGYg

Over the course of the album’s nine tracks, Allbrook takes us on a journey through Go Betweens-eque rock on tracks like ‘Commodore’, melodramatic balladry in ‘Vale The Chord’, and delightful spoken word collage-turned-chaos on ‘Mazda’. Like everything we’ve heard from POND, the repeat listener is rewarded with layers and lines revealing themselves each time you dip in.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0drxsir1tfw

Allbrook will be hitting the road as of next week (or tonight if you’re catching Weyes Blood in Perth) with a couple of US solo shows in there for good mix. Check out the record, dates and below and head here to snap up some tix: