The Black Sorrows

Already an Aussie-rock veteran through his tenure with bluesy hitmakers Jo Jo Zep & The Falcons, sax-wielding singer Joe Camilleri graduated to national-treasure status with his next band, The Black Sorrows. Formed in 1983, the Melbourne group initially provided Camilleri with an outlet to dig deeper into old-school sounds like zydeco and ‘50s rhythm ‘n’ blues, but The Black Sorrows gradually blossomed into a robust roots-rock collective—with added vocal firepower from sisters Vika and Linda Bull—that would make regular appearances on Australian album charts and award shows well into the early ’90s. On signature singles like “Hold On to Me” and “Chained to the Wheel”, Camilleri and co. effortlessly fused Cajun-flavoured sounds with polished radio-ready hooks in a fashion that mirrored the contemporaneous hits of John Mellencamp circa The Lonesome Jubilee. Ever since this commercially successful iteration of the group dissolved in 1994, the Sorrows have essentially existed as Camilleri’s solo project. But while the list of band members who’ve come and gone could fill a phone book, Camilleri has never wavered from his pursuit of modernist, anthemic roots music, sounding as raggedly glorious as ever on 2021’s Saint Georges Road.