By Ethan Seiderman
It started in a dark corner at Bar Josephine. Three mates, a few beers, and a half-serious suggestion: “We should start a punk band.” The result was Milk After Sex—a name that’s as hard to explain to your mum as it is to Google.
“We thought it’d be one gig for a laugh,” says Jack. “But we loved it—and people kept showing up.”
Milk After Sex—Jack, Sean, Jasper, Miriam and Joel—didn’t set out with big aspirations. The main goal was just to have some fun. They were bored, mostly unemployed, and had mornings free. “We used to rehearse at 9:30am,” says Jasper. “We were working nights, so it made sense.”
In those early months, every rehearsal spat out a new song. Their first EP, Footscray Road Open Day, landed fast and raw on Bandcamp, with tracks like ‘Climate Consumer’ and ‘Three Quarter Panic Attack’—a song that opens with: ‘I’m having a panic attack, in my three quarter pants.’ It’s ridiculous, but also painfully real.
They’ve slowed down since, mostly because life got busier—and the gigs started rolling in. Now, practice is about tightening setlists, not churning out tracks. “None of us had really gigged before,” says Jasper. “It’s been fun figuring it out together.”
Then there’s the name. Yes, people ask. No, according to Jack “it’s not advice.”
“It came from a true story,” Sean explains. “A friend’s housemate used to chug milk after sex.”
“I’ve since heard of someone else who does it too,” adds Jasper. “Apparently, it’s a thing.”
It’s funny—until your parents Google it. “Miriam, our sax player, got a text from her mum saying we needed to change the name,” Jasper laughs. “Too late.”
But like all good band names, it fits. Milk After Sex is bold, absurd, and weirdly earnest. Milk After Sex doesn’t sound cool—and that’s kind of the point.
Their songs lampoon the faux-woke, inner-north aesthetic with biting affection. ‘I’m not your typical suit, yeah, I wear colourful socks,’ Jack sings, skewering the smug, softly-spoken corporate types who preach equity from investment properties.
“There’s an arrogance over there,” Jack says, referring to Melbourne’s north. “They look down on Footscray. I wanted to say ‘f*#k ya—I’ll be arrogant too.’”
The irony isn’t lost on their fans. “Private school kids from the north love it,” he says. “They’re self-aware at least.”
“We’re taking the piss out of them,” Jasper adds, “but also out of ourselves. That ‘west is best’ stuff? We mock that too.”
Despite the coming and going of a global pandemic and the ever present threat of gentrification, Footscray’s music scene is thriving. “When we were kids, places like Kindred and The Reverence put on underage shows,” says Jasper. “It gave us a way in.” Their first ever gigs were at Mama Chen’s—then the Dancing Dog. “We were fifteen,” Jack grins.
As for sound, the band draws from all directions. “Garage, sharpie, chonky riffs,” says Jasper. “I got to play the kind of guitar I couldn’t in my other bands—power chord driven, gained up.”
The band’s influences are broad; Lobby Loyde, The Streets, TISM. “Not the sound, the spirit,” Jack explains. “Cheeky, fun, sharp. That’s what we’re about.”
So what’s next?
“An album,” Jack says. “We’ve got momentum. We are genuinely pulling good crowds to our gigs and we want to keep that up.”
World domination?
“No way,” laughs Jasper. “We just wanted to tour Footscray. Domenico’s Pizza, Footscray Hotel, Mamma Chen’s. We’ve only ticked off one.”
Domenico’s—if you’re reading—hit them up.
