GW3 at Kindred Bandroom
18 July 2026 in Melbourne, supported by Jungle Jim Smith.
This one was a little gig, the kind where you feel like you might be the only genuine punters in the room, and everyone else is the band's friends and family.
All the same, Gippslanders GW3 and Jungle Jim Smith seemed happy to be playing in the well kitted-out bandroom at Kindred Studios in Yarraville. The venue is an extremely pleasant walk from our place along the bike paths. We began the night with food and drink at Hop Nation, another local favourite.
Right near Hop Nation is the peculiar hellmouth into the West Gate Tunnel, an overblown freeway that cost billions and has like two cars on it. It's so weird I recommend standing on the bike path and looking at it whilst pondering life, the universe and everything.
The music, however.
Jungle Jim Smith, a one-man band with a three-stringed cigar box guitar, a kick drum at his left foot and something lagerphonesque at his right, opened with a song about running out of weed. That took me back, to be honest. Well-spent youth. I won't bore you by going off on that tangent.
GW3 is one of those bands that exists thanks to a love of music and being good at making it. As the monkey in their backdrop explains (see image), they used to be GW2 but then someone else joined the band and so the monkey torched the GW2 matchbook and lit the GW3 dynamite.
I am guessing the newest bandmember is the drummer who is the son of one of the other two. I actually have no idea, but the monkey image is so evocative that I feel confident making things up.
They're a great band, not very easy to pigeonhole, kind of psychedelic folk with vocals a bit in the style of Bob Dylan. They're great to watch, just to enjoy people who are good at stuff - lap steel, bass and drums.
After the show we walked past the Footscray Hotel which was full of old drag queens playing pool. Of course we popped in for a couple of pots and to discuss footy and dogs.
The Footscray is still the Footscray. We discovered that Z(ero Shugga) the dog has grown up into a sweetie-pie and stopped biting (she drew blood last time I saw her!), and that Brian (the proprietor) has Libba's phone number in his contacts.
