10 years of Bag Raiders.

Over the decade since releasing their debut self-titled record, Sydney duo Bag Raiders have racked up over three billion streams, played shows all over the world, and soundtracked more memes than any music could even dream of (yes, we have it on good authority that this is what all musicians dream of). So it makes sense that 10 years on we’re celebrating the immersive electro-pop sounds of tracks like ‘Way Back Home’, ‘Sunlight’ and ‘Shooting Stars’ with a 10th anniversary edition which includes a saucey vinyl release and remastered videos.

“Back when we first started out, we were fooling around in a garden shed in Rose Bay purely for the fun and craft of creating music. We never would have dreamed that we’d be able to take what we were doing, turn it into something real and play these songs all around the world a dozen times over,” they say of the band’s formative years.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BAdLRRbzOv4&feature=youtu.be

Throughout their years of delivering tasty beats to the masses, especially around those golden years of The Presets, Midnight Juggernauts, Van She and Bang Gang, it’s safe to assume that the pair have had their fair share of wild nights. Prior to the COVID-19 lockdown, that was something we at LWA were quite partial to ourselves, so we thought we’d hit them up to share with us some “war stories” of parties gone. Check it out below and head here to get your 10th Anniversary edition of Bag Raiders:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSENH3FE2As&feature=emb_title

1. Shooting Stars launch

“Seems like a lifetime ago now, but this was a wild time for us and kinda where it all started with the launch for Shooting Stars. Little did we know how big the song was going to become. This was a great time with the Bang Gang crew and so many of pals, getting sweating at Oxford Art Factory”

Pic by Pat Stevenson

2. Bang Gang

“Well, what can we say, or remember?! Bang Gang was the best of times. One of the most iconic parties in Sydney hands down. We met so many of our friends there, cut our teeth on the decks and had some hilarious kick ons! Special love to our homie Ajax and to Jaime Doom, Dangerous Dan, Gus da Hoodrat, DJ Damage and Double Nolan. Legendary!!”

Pic by Pat Stevenson

3. Parklife

“We debuted our live show for the first time on the Parklife national festival tour in 2010. Dan Black joined us on vocals for some of the shows and it was a real buzz. There’s a great video by Pat Stevenson somewhere online that pretty much sums it up. Mental!!”

Pic by Pat Stevenson

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=by2_2eonxv0

4. UNDR Ctrl’s 1st Birthday

“Back at OAF for our agencies 1st Birthday and it was just one of those proper fun nights out ya know? There was an all white theme and it was absolutely packed. They’d arranged a balloon drop to coincide with us playing Shooting Stars, but a couple of loose units jumped up on somebody’s shoulders and pulled the whole thing down just before we played the track! Classic. Then we had a full stage invasion and could barely see the decks, haha!”
Image by Jack Toohey

5. Metro Theatre

“One of our last shows in Sydney was our Horizons album tour. Here we debuted our brand new live rig and set up for the first time. Tbh it was all pretty stressful cos we were running on a tight schedule to manufacture the rig in China and get all the graphics for the live show together in time, set up and rehearsed… BUT… it all came together (just) on the night and it was very special. We brought out Panama and Mickey Kojak as special guests.”

Pic by Pat Stevenson