EARLY DAYS: 1974-77
Beginning in Adelaide in late 1973, it wasn’t till January 1974 that the band began playing under their new and definitive moniker, Cold Chisel. In 1975 Cold Chisel consolidated into its classic line-up:
Jimmy Barnes (vocals): born in Glasgow, Scotland
Ian Moss (guitar/vocals): born in Alice Springs, Northern Territory
Steve Prestwich (drums): born in Liverpool, UK
Phil Small (bass): born in Adelaide, South Australia
Don Walker (piano): born in Ayr, Queensland
Cold Chisel moved to Sydney via Melbourne in 1976. Impassioned hard rock covers got the band gigs while Don Walker developed original songs. He zeroed in on the hopes, fears, anger and alienation, as well as the humour, of the working and student under-classes. Appreciative Cold Chisel armies formed. They followed the band from venue to venue, appearing just before Cold Chisel played and leaving directly afterwards. In late 1977, WEA (now Warner Music) signed the band to a modest contract, just in case there was a hit record somewhere in the mayhem.
LIGHT A LONG FUSE: 1978-79
The first two albums, Cold Chisel and Breakfast at Sweethearts presented the live classics Khe Sanh, Home and Broken Hearted, One Long Day, Merry-Go-Round, Shipping Steel, Breakfast at Sweethearts and Goodbye (Astrid Goodbye). But the band was not happy with either album. Cold Chisel suffered from studio debutante nerves. Production difficulties on Breakfast left a bitter aftertaste. Khe Sanh, originally banned from commercial radio for its lyric content, subsequently became Australia’s ‘unofficial national anthem’ and the Australian cricket team’s victory song. In late 1979, they found studio satisfaction recording Choirgirl with young producer/engineer Mark Opitz.
#1 WITH A BULLET: 1980/82
The 1980 Top 10 single, Cheap Wine, previewed the album East, where all band members contributed songs. East peaked at #2 then stayed in the Top 10 for 26 weeks and in the chart for a record 63 weeks. Choirgirl, Cheap Wine, Star Hotel, Rising Sun, Standing on the Outside and Four Walls became embedded into our national identity. The double live Swingshift hit #1 in 1981. Two months later the band toured America. Live performances rattled headliners including Joe Walsh and Cheap Trick but East went missing from the charts before the band arrived and it never returned. Back in Australia, the band recorded Circus Animals, which was led-out by Barnes’ vehement You Got Nothing I Want. Walker’s songwriting advanced into the compelling, spleen-venting rock of Taipan, Houndog and Letter to Alan. The melodic uplift of Prestwich’s Forever Now and When the War is Over and Moss’ Bow River became radio staples. Forever Now made #4, Cold Chisel’s only Top 5 single.
UP & DOWN & OUT: 1983
1983 began with a triumphant headlining performance at the Narara Music Festival before a jubilant crowd of 30,000. But by August the band had begun to splinter, with Prestwich the first to go and tensions between the other members reaching breaking point. Cold Chisel decided it was ‘time gentlemen please’ and recalled Prestwich to complete a final album and for a 26-date arena tour, The Last Stand. The album, Twentieth Century, added the title track, Saturday Night, Painted Doll, No Sense, Hold Me Tight and Flame Trees to the Cold Chisel paradigm. The album debuted #1 early 1984.
CHISEL BY CHOICE: 1984/2010
Jimmy Barnes hit the ground running with 1984’s Bodyswerve, the first of eight consecutive #1 albums (Barnes has now scored 12 individual # 1 albums), while Walker, Moss, Prestwich and Small took time to reaffirm themselves. In 1989, Don Walker formed Catfish and released Unlimited Address while Ian Moss debuted #1 with the album Matchbook, with many of the songs written by Walker. Steve Prestwich joined Little River Band for a period and developed his songwriting. Phil Small forsook music for family life. But radio and record buyers kept Cold Chisel as present tense and ultimately the band decided to work together again in 1995. In 1998, after traversing many speed humps a new album, The Last Wave of Summer, debuted #1 with 100,000 presales. The title track, Yakuza Girls, Way Down and Things I Love in You stood tall next to the band’s earlier work. The triumphant Last Wave arena tour drew 150,000. Lingering disputes within the band were resolved in 2003/4 by 16 Ringside shows that exhilarated band and audiences. “It’s been fun darlings,” said Barnes, “Let’s do it again sometime.” One-off performances followed: In 2005, Cold Chisel headlined the Melbourne benefit for Boxing Day tsunami victims. In December 2009, Cold Chisel played to 50,000 at the Sydney V8 Supercars event and in October 2010 the band headlined the Deni Ute Muster to a record-breaking crowd of 25,000.
FOREVER NOW: 2011
In 2010 Jimmy Barnes, Ian Moss, Don Walker, Steve Prestwich and Phil Small got together secretly and wrote and recorded a handful of songs and realised that the magic was there. With plans to continue performing and recording, the band was gutted in January 2011 when drummer Steve Prestwich passed away suddenly as a result of complications from a brain tumour. With Steve’s performances and some of his songs captured on tape, the band ultimately felt compelled to continue with the plans they had begun. Recording continued through May and June with drummer Charley Drayton.
In July 2011, the band rolled out the biggest archival release in Australian music history, remastering all of their extensive catalogue and unearthing 56 new or rare live and studio recordings. It was the first time ever that the band had released their music digitally and it saw 8 of their albums hit the ARIA Top 100 Albums chart and numerous songs hit the singles chart. In a strange twist of fate, almost 35 years after it was first released Khe Sanh hit the Australian Top 40 for the first time!
Cold Chisel then announced their most extensive tour in 30 years and when tickets for the Light The Nitro tour were released in early August, the band was overwhelmed by the massive public reaction, selling over 170,000 tickets in the first day and ultimately going on to sell over 325,000 tickets across Australia and New Zealand.
But the stats were just the background … when the band stepped onstage for the first of the shows of the Light The Nitro tour the music did the talking. Across the country, the tour was met with unanimous raves reviews from the critics and the public alike. Meanwhile their compilation album, The Best of Cold Chisel – All For You, which featured 2 of their new recordings, debuted at #2 on the national ARIA Albums chart and is now officially triple platinum.
NO PLANS / THE LIVE TAPES: 2012 – 2014
In April 2012 Cold Chisel released its 7th studio album, No Plans, which was the album they started recording in 2010, and it features the last recorded performances of Steve Prestwich. No Plans was universally hailed by the critics and debuted at # 1 on the ARIA Australian Albums Chart and the iTunes album chart and immediately went gold. The band played four special shows around the release of the album, including headlining the 2012 Bluesfest festival in Byron Bay (the first Australian band to do so) and an intimate, one-night-only show at Sydney’s Hordern Pavilion. In an Australian first, the Hordern Pavilion show was broadcast live to over 100 cinemas around Australia.
In late 2013, Cold Chisel announced that after 35 years of working with Warner Music they were establishing their own label, Cold Chisel Music, with distribution by Universal Music Australia. Cold Chisel Music now releases all of the band’s existing catalogue of music, concert films and any new recordings. The first new release was The Live Tapes – Vol 1 – Live at the Hordern, documenting on film and audio the band’s blistering Hordern Pavilion show in April 2012 (subsequent releases Live Tapes – Vol 2 – Live At Bombay Rock 1979 was released in 2014 and Live Tapes – Vol 3 – Live at the Manly Vale Hotel 1980 was released in late 2016).
In January 2013 the band was honoured by Australia Post as part of the Australian Legend stamp series – the second time an Australian stamp has featured Cold Chisel. In November 2014 Cold Chisel’s Khe Sanh was added to the National Film and Sound Archive’s Sounds of Australia registry of historically, culturally and aesthetically significant sound recordings.
ONE NIGHT STAND: 2015
In March 2015, Cold Chisel returned to Adelaide, where it all began for them 40 years earlier, and played a special one-off show as part of the Clipsal 500, attracting a record Clipsal crowd of 35,000+ for their blistering performance. The band also entered the studio across February and March to begin work on their 8th studio album. The resulting album, The Perfect Crime, was released in October 2015 and debuted at # 1 on the ARIA Top 100 Australia Albums Chart. Receiving huge critical acclaim, the album was immediately certified Gold.
In May 2015, Cold Chisel announced two special shows under the banner The ‘Last Stand’ of Sydney’s Entertainment Centre, to mark the closing of the iconic Sydney venue in December 2015. Referencing its legendary 1983 Last Stand Tour, the announcement captured the fascination and excitement of music fans across the country – selling all 20,000 tickets within minutes.
So overwhelming was the demand for these shows that the band responded by announcing its One Night Stand national tour, which had 18 stops across Australia and New Zealand, concluding at Sydney’s Entertainment Centre in December with three shows that literally brought the house down.
GETTING THE BAND BACK TOGETHER: 2016 – 2023
At the APRA Awards in April 2016, Cold Chisel received the prestigious Ted Albert Award for Outstanding Services to Australian Music. And Don Walker’s acceptance speech said it all so much better than all of these words: http://www.coldchisel.com/don-walker-acceptance-speech-cold-chisel-ted-albert-award-for-outstanding-services-to-australian-music.
On June 23, 2017 Cold Chisel announced two special shows, one in Newcastle at the inaugural Newcastle 500 Supercar race on Saturday November 25 and the other at the Derwent Entertainment Centre on Thursday November 23.
The band also announced the November 2017 release of their biggest live release ever – The ‘Last Stand’ of The Sydney Entertainment Centre – The Live Tapes Vol 4 – 32 songs drawn from the band’s last two nights at the Sydney Entertainment Centre before the iconic venue was demolished.
October 2019 saw Cold Chisel announce their ninth studio album Blood Moon alongside the 15-date national Blood Moon Tour 2020, which was their first ever outdoor Summer tour. The critically acclaimed album dropped in December 2019 and debuted at #1 on the ARIA Album Chart (breaking the record for the Australian band with most time between their first #1 and their latest – 38 years from 1981 until 2019). The sold out tour saw Cold Chisel play some of their biggest shows ever (24,000 people in Geelong) and they became the first band to play the huge (and sold out) Bankwest Stadium in Parramatta (25,000 people). Additionally, Getting The Band Back Together, the single from Blood Moon, won the award for the Most Performed Rock Work at the 2021 APRA Awards.
In December 2020, Cold Chisel released the visceral Live Tapes Vol 5 – Live At The Bondi Lifesaver, Feb 1980, which featured numerous pre-East songs sporting different arrangements and lyrics. The band were captured here in hi-speed form.
In late 2023, the band celebrated the 40th Anniversary of legendary Last Stand shows with a stunning box set, collecting everything recorded and filmed from those shows on vinyl, CD and DVD.
50 – NOT OUT: 2024
On 29 May 2024 Cold Chisel announced their 50th Anniversary Tour: The Big Five-0, with special guests The Cruel Sea and Karen Lee Andrews playing most shows. It sees the band playing special gigs under a circus big top tent in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane and then unique shows in other locations around the country before concluding where it all began for Cold Chisel, in Adelaide, on 17 November 2024.
The band also announced a new and definitive greatest hits double album 50 Years – The Best Of (which features one new Don Walker-penned song You’ve Got To Move). It is set for release on 23 August 2024.
——————————————————
With accumulated album sales of almost 7 million and an unquenchable demand for tickets whenever they tour, the Australian public continues to reaffirm its deep connection with the inimitable Cold Chisel.
COLD CHISEL: RECENT HIGHLIGHTS
- 7.3 million albums sold in Australia
- ARIA Hall of Fame Inductees
- 2011: Massive archival and digital release – 8 albums entering the ARIA Top 100 Album Chart
- 2011: Light The Nitro Tour sold 325,000 tickets (biggest ever tour by an Australian-based band). 170,000 tickets sold in the first day alone.
- 2011: All For You – The Best of Cold Chisel album has remained in the ARIA Top 100 for over 355 weeks. Officially 4 x Platinum.
- 2012: Album No Plans debuted at #1 on ARIA Top 100 Australia Albums Chart. It achieves Gold accreditation
- 2013: Cold Chisel honoured with its own stamp as part of the ‘Australian Legends’ Stamp Series
- 2014: Khe Sanh added to the National Film and Sound Archive’s Sounds of Australia registry of historically, culturally and aesthetically significant sound recordings
- 2015 March: Cold Chisel played to a record 35,000+ people at the Clipsal 500, Adelaide
- 2015 May: Cold Chisel sold 20,000 tickets within minutes to their The ‘Last Stand’ of Sydney’s Entertainment Centre shows, to mark the closure of the iconic venue. The band soon announces its One Night Stand Tour, playing one show only at 18 stops across Australia and New Zealand. Cold Chisel becomes the first Australian band to headline (and sell-out) the famous Hanging Rock at Mt Macedon, Victoria.
- 2015 October: The band’s 8th studio album The Perfect Crime debuted at # 1 on ARIA Top 100 Australia Albums Chart. Receiving incredible critical acclaim, the album was immediately certified Gold.
- 2016 APRA Awards: Cold Chisel receives the prestigious Ted Albert Award for Outstanding Services to Australian Music
- 2019 December: The band’s 9th studio album Blood Moon debuted at #1 on the ARIA Album Chart – breaking the record for the Australian band with most time between their first #1 and their latest – 38 years from 1981 until 2019.
- Early 2020: Cold Chisel played some of their biggest shows ever on their first national outdoor Summer tour, the sold out Blood Moon Tour 2020
EARLY DAYS: 1973-77
Beginning in Adelaide in 1973, it wasn’t until 1975 that Cold Chisel consolidated into its definitive line-up:
Jimmy Barnes (vocals): born in Glasgow, Scotland
Ian Moss (guitar/vocals): born in Alice Springs, Northern Territory
Steve Prestwich (drums): born in Liverpool, UK
Phil Small (bass): born in Adelaide, South Australia
Don Walker (piano): born in Ayr, Queensland
Cold Chisel moved to Sydney via Melbourne in 1976. Impassioned hard rock covers got the band gigs while Don Walker developed original songs. He zeroed in on the hopes, fears, anger and alienation, as well as the humour, of the working and student under-classes. Appreciative Cold Chisel armies formed. They followed the band from venue to venue, appearing just before Cold Chisel played and leaving directly afterwards. In late 1977, WEA (now Warner Music) signed the band to a modest contract, just in case there was a hit record somewhere in the mayhem.
LIGHT A LONG FUSE: 1978-79
The first two albums, Cold Chisel and Breakfast at Sweethearts presented the live classics “Khe Sanh”, “Home and Broken Hearted”, “One Long Day”, “Merry-Go-Round”, “Shipping Steel”, “Breakfast at Sweethearts” and “Goodbye (Astrid Goodbye)”. But the band was not happy with either album. Cold Chisel suffered from studio debutante nerves. Production difficulties on Breakfast left a bitter aftertaste. “Khe Sanh”, originally banned from commercial radio for its lyric content, subsequently became Australia’s ‘unofficial national anthem’ and the Australian cricket team’s victory song. In late 1979, they found studio satisfaction recording “Choirgirl” with young producer/engineer Mark Opitz.
#1 WITH A BULLET: 1980/82
The 1980 Top 10 single, “Cheap Wine”, previewed the album East, where all band members contributed songs. East peaked at #2 then stayed in the Top 10 for 26 weeks and in the chart for a record 63 weeks. “Choirgirl”, “Cheap Wine”, “Star Hotel”, “Rising Sun”, “Standing on the Outside” and “Four Walls” became embedded into our national identity. The double live Swingshift hit #1 in 1981. Two months later the band toured America. Live performances rattled headliners including Joe Walsh and Cheap Trick but East went missing from the charts before the band arrived and it never returned. Back in Australia, the band recorded Circus Animals, which was led-out by Barnes’ vehement “You Got Nothing I Want”. Walker’s songwriting advanced into the compelling, spleen-venting rock of “Taipan”, “Houndog” and “Letter to Alan”. The melodic uplift of Prestwich’s “Forever Now” and “When the War is Over” and Moss’ “Bow River” became radio staples. “Forever Now” made #4, Cold Chisel’s only Top 5 single.
UP & DOWN & OUT: 1983
1983 began with a triumphant headlining performance at the Narara Music Festival before a jubilant crowd of 30,000. But by August the band had begun to splinter, with Prestwich the first to go and tensions between the other members reaching breaking point. Cold Chisel decided it was ‘time gentlemen please’ and recalled Prestwich to complete a final album and for a 26-date arena tour, The Last Stand. The album, Twentieth Century, added the title track, “Saturday Night”, “Painted Doll”, “No Sense”, “Hold Me Tight” and “Flame Trees” to the Cold Chisel paradigm. The album debuted #1 early 1984.
CHISEL BY CHOICE: 1984/2010
Jimmy Barnes hit the ground running with 1984’s Bodyswerve, the first of eight consecutive #1 albums, while Walker, Moss, Prestwich and Small took time to reaffirm themselves. In 1989, Don Walker formed Catfish and released Unlimited Address while Ian Moss debuted #1 with the album Matchbook, the majority of songs written by Walker. Steve Prestwich joined Little River Band for a period and developed his songwriting. Phil Small forsook music for family life. But radio and record buyers kept Cold Chisel as present tense and ultimately the band decided to work together again in 1995. In 1998, after traversing many speed humps a new album, The Last Wave of Summer, debuted #1 with 100,000 presales. The title track, “Yakuza Girls”, “Way Down” and “Things I Love in You” stood tall next to the band’s earlier work. The triumphant Last Wave arena tour drew 150,000. Lingering disputes within the band were resolved in 2003/4 by 16 Ringside shows that exhilarated band and audiences. “It’s been fun darlings,” said Barnes, “Let’s do it again sometime.” One-off performances followed: In 2005, Cold Chisel headlined the Melbourne benefit for Boxing Day tsunami victims. In December 2009, Cold Chisel played to 50,000 at the Sydney V8 Supercars event and in October 2010 the band headlined the Deni Ute Muster to a record-breaking crowd of 25,000.
FOREVER NOW: 2011
In 2010 Jimmy Barnes, Ian Moss, Don Walker, Steve Prestwich and Phil Small got together secretly and wrote and recorded a handful of songs and realised that the magic was there. With plans to continue performing and recording, the band was gutted in January 2011 when drummer Steve Prestwich passed away suddenly as a result of complications from a brain tumour. With Steve’s performances and some of his songs captured on tape, the band ultimately felt compelled to continue with the plans they had begun. Recording continued through May and June with drummer Charley Drayton.
In July 2011, the band rolled out the biggest archival release in Australian music history, remastering all of their extensive catalogue and unearthing 56 new or rare live and studio recordings. It was the first time ever that the band had released their music digitally and it saw 8 of their albums hit the ARIA Top 100 Albums chart and numerous songs hit the singles chart. In a strange twist of fate, almost 35 years after it was first released “Khe Sanh” hit the Australian Top 40 for the first time!
Cold Chisel then announced their most extensive tour in 30 years and when tickets for the Light The Nitro tour were released in early August, the band was overwhelmed by the massive public reaction, selling over 170,000 tickets in the first day and ultimately going on to sell over 325,000 tickets across Australia and New Zealand.
But the stats were just the background… when the band stepped onstage for the first of the shows of the Light The Nitro tour the music did the talking. Across the country, the tour was met with unanimous raves reviews from the critics and the public alike. Meanwhile their compilation album, “The Best of Cold Chisel – All For You”, which featured 2 of their new recordings, debuted at #2 on the national ARIA Albums chart and is now officially triple platinum.
NO PLANS / THE LIVE TAPES: 2012 – 2014
In April 2012 Cold Chisel released its 7th studio album, No Plans, which was the album they started recording in 2010, and it features the last recorded performances of Steve Prestwich. No Plans was universally hailed by the critics and debuted at # 1 on the ARIA Australian Albums Chart and the iTunes album chart and immediately went gold. The band played four special shows around the release of the album, including headlining the 2012 Bluesfest festival in Byron Bay (the first Australian band to do so) and an intimate, one-night-only show at Sydney’s Hordern Pavilion. In an Australian first, the Hordern Pavilion show was broadcast live to over 100 cinemas around Australia.
In late 2013, Cold Chisel announced that after 35 years of working with Warner Music they were establishing their own label, Cold Chisel Music, with distribution by Universal Music Australia. Cold Chisel Music now releases all of the band’s existing catalogue of music, concert films and any new recordings. The first new release was The Live Tapes – Vol 1 – Live at the Hordern, documenting on film and audio the band’s blistering Hordern Pavilion show in April 2012 (subsequent releases Live Tapes – Vol 2 – Live At Bombay Rock 1979 was released in 2014 and Live Tapes – Vol 3 – Live at the Manly Vale Hotel, 1980 was released in late 2016).
In January 2013 the band was honoured by Australia Post as part of the Australian Legend stamp series – the second time an Australian stamp has featured Cold Chisel. In November 2014 Cold Chisel’s ‘Khe Sanh’ was added to the National Film and Sound Archive’s Sounds of Australia registry of historically, culturally and aesthetically significant sound recordings.
ONE NIGHT STAND: 2015
In March 2015, Cold Chisel returned to Adelaide, where it all began for them 40 years earlier, and played a special one-off show as part of the Clipsal 500, attracting a record Clipsal crowd of 35,000+ for their blistering performance. The band also entered the studio across February and March to begin work on their 8th studio album. The resulting album, The Perfect Crime, was released in October 2015 and debuted at # 1 on the ARIA Top 100 Australia Albums Chart. Receiving huge critical acclaim, the album was immediately certified Gold.
In May 2015, Cold Chisel announced two special shows under the banner The ‘Last Stand’ of Sydney’s Entertainment Centre, to mark the closing of the iconic Sydney venue in December 2015. Referencing its legendary 1983 Last Stand tour, the announcement captured the fascination and excitement of music fans across the country – selling all 20,000 tickets within minutes.
So overwhelming was the demand for these shows that the band responded by announcing its One Night Stand national tour, which had 18 stops across Australia and New Zealand, concluding at Sydney’s Entertainment Centre in December with three shows that literally brought the house down.
LOOKING FORWARD: 2016 – NOW
At the APRA Awards in April 2016, Cold Chisel received the prestigious Ted Albert Award for Outstanding Services to Australian Music. And Don Walker’s acceptance speech said it all so much better than all of these words: https://www.coldchisel.com/don-walker-acceptance-speech-cold-chisel-ted-albert-award-for-outstanding-services-to-australian-music.
On June 23, 2017 Cold Chisel announced two special shows, one in Newcastle at the inaugural Newcastle 500 Supercar race on Saturday November 25 and the other at the Derwent Entertainment Centre on Thursday November 23. This marks the band’s first shows in these cities since the Light The Nitro tour in 2011.
The band also announced the November 2017 release of their biggest live release ever – The ‘Last Stand’ of The Sydney Entertainment Centre – The Live Tapes Vol 4 – 32 songs drawn from the band’s last two nights at the Sydney Entertainment Centre before the iconic venue was demolished.
In late 2018, Cold Chisel released their iconic Best Of compilation ‘All For You’ on vinyl for the very first time – helping push the 4 x Platinum record back into the ARIA Albums Chart top 5, with the album remaining in the top 40 for an additional 30 weeks and counting. According to media reports, the band will be recording new music for release over the summer of 2019/20.
October 2019 saw Cold Chisel announce their ninth studio album ‘Blood Moon’ alongside the 15-date national ‘Blood Moon Tour 2020’, which was their first ever outdoor Summer tour. The critically acclaimed album dropped in December 2019 and debuted at #1 on the ARIA Album Chart (breaking the record for the Australian band with most time between their first #1 and their latest – 38 years from 1981 until 2019). The sold out tour saw Cold Chisel play some of their biggest shows ever (24,000 people in Geelong) and they became the first band to play the huge (and sold out) Bankwest Stadium in Parramatta (25,000 people).
———————————————-
With accumulated album sales of almost 7 million and an unquenchable demand for tickets whenever they tour, the Australian public continues to reaffirm its deep connection with the inimitable Cold Chisel.
COLD CHISEL: RECENT HIGHLIGHTS
6.9 Million albums sold in Australia
ARIA Hall of Fame Inductees
2011 Massive archival and digital release – 8 albums entering the ARIA Top 100 Album Chart.
2011 Light The Nitro tour sold 325,000 tickets (biggest ever tour by an Australian-based band). 170,000 tickets sold in the first day alone.
2011 All For You – The Best of Cold Chisel album has never fallen out of the ARIA Top 100 Album Chart (253 weeks so far). Officially Triple Platinum.
2012 Album No Plans debuted at # 1 on ARIA Top 100 Australia Albums Chart. It achieves Gold accreditation.
2013 Cold Chisel honoured with its own stamp as part of the ‘Australian Legends’ Stamp Series
2014 ‘Khe Sanh’ added to the National Film and Sound Archive’s Sounds of Australia registry of historically, culturally and aesthetically significant sound recordings
2015 March: Cold Chisel played to a record 35,000+ people at the Clipsal 500, Adelaide
2015 May: Cold Chisel sold 20,000 tickets within minutes to their The ‘Last Stand’ of Sydney’s Entertainment Centre shows, to mark the closure of the iconic venue. The band soon announces its One Night Stand tour, playing one show only at 18 stops across Australia and New Zealand. Cold Chisel becomes the first Australian band to headline (and sell-out) the famous Hanging Rock at Mt Macedon, Victoria.
2015 October: The band’s 8th studio album The Perfect Crime debuted at # 1 on ARIA Top 100 Australia Albums Chart. Receiving incredible critical acclaim, the album was immediately certified Gold.
2016 At the APRA Awards, Cold Chisel receives the prestigious Ted Albert Award for Outstanding Services to Australian Music.
2019 December: The band’s 9th studio album ‘Blood Moon’ debuted at #1 on the ARIA Album Chart – breaking the record for the Australian band with most time between their first #1 and their latest – 38 years from 1981 until 2019.
Early 2020: Cold Chisel played some of their biggest shows ever on their first national outdoor Summer tour, the sold out ‘Blood Moon Tour 2020’
