The Monstrous Blues burst onto the scene in 2000 supporting The Meanies at the Metro in Sydney. If their huge sound is familiar, it could be that the Blues are comprised of two fifths of the original line-up of legendary Australian rock dogs Tumbleweed. “Myself and Steve [O’Brien] were in Tumbleweed up until Galactaphonic and the singles associated with that, about 1995 I think?” Hausmeister says. He has no time for grunge rock sentimentalism, however, feeling more energized by the current musical climate than he has for a long time. “I’m actually more excited about what’s happening now than what I have been in the last ten years”, he says, “I mean, the whole Mudhoney / Dinosaur Jr thing that came out at the time was awesome, it was fucking great, but it just died. I think maybe it was commercialized, but I think we just grew sick of it”.

He sees the current rediscovery of rock as a chance for guitar based music to come to the fore again: ‘There’s a few local stations up here [in Wollongong] that usually play Mariah Carey all the time, but these days you get Foo Fighters, even Queens of The Stone Age get a bit of a go during the day. It’s pretty amazing, I mean, ten years ago they wouldn’t have touched Nirvana – they would have been scared of it”.

It is clear after listening to the first few minutes of the album Colourblind, that the name ‘Monstrous Blues’ has nothing to do with the blooze at all. In fact, they take their moniker from the working title for the Blue Meanies from famed stoner party viewing, The Yellow Submarine. But there is also a more intriguing bent: “big Blue Marlin [fishes] are called ‘monstrous blues’ in fishing speak, I later found out”, Hausmeister muses conspiratorially, “some fishing freak at work told me that”. So is game fishing the latest rock and roll pastime? “I don’t even eat the things!” he laughs, “apart from fishing for cases of beer as they float by”.

The new album Colourblind follows 2001’s well-received EP, High Octane, which garnered both good reviews and radio play, and also saw the band categorized as ‘stoner rock’. But like fellow stoner graduates QOTSA (another sophomore project who have, some would argue, moved on from Kyuss’ swampy groove), Monstrous Blues have intensified their, well, monstrous bottom end to a tighter Detroit Motor City party sound, and emerged more energetic and even more coast-to-coast non-stop-R-O-C-K. Witness the whiplash handbrake turn from the pounding, robotic groove of System Emanating to the sparkplug power of Waterlogged, and it becomes clear that Colourblind is an excellent driving album. In fact, fuck driving, Monstrous Blues are the half-time entertainment to the fastest reverse NASCAR destruction derby this side of Escape From Thunderdome, where the cars are set on fire and the drivers are intravenously fed a speedball of Ketamine and Sudafed. So are Monstrous Blues the last of the great V8’s? “I think a Speedway would be an ideal gig, I’m a NASCAR freak!” Hausmeister enthuses, “We’re doing a clip for Blemished, the first single off the album, and it’s full of 1967 Super-8 footage of the Kembla Grange Speedway. It’s pretty cool”.

So rock and roll is safe in the hands of the Monstrous Blues – just don’t let them behind the wheel of your beloved Datsun, unless you want it torched, the seats slashed and the engine steaming. Because that’s what you’ll get if you turn up to one of their incendiary live shows. They play with head-vaporizing volume and energy, and will be heading down Melbourne way to launch the album: “We’ll go to Sydney [after the Wollongong launch], and then down to see you guys in Melbourne”. Hausmeister is excited to be playing at Melbourne’s infamous rock pits The Tote and The Espy. “We’ve been lucky in Melbourne; we’ve played a few times and we’ve either played The Espy, The Tote, or The Corner. We know the history behind those places, and what they mean to the local rock scene, so we’ve been really lucky to play there – we must have friends in high places!”
Or perhaps they’ve just got the rock & roll skills to pay the bills.