Faker, one of Australia’s defining alternative rock bands of the 2000s is back with a new album Enjoy Your Problems out September 4th.
After a fifteen-year hiatus, Nathan Hudson revived the band’s social media accounts on October 4th, 2020 posting “I went on a big adventure and disbanded the band, because I guess I needed to. Then the world went a little bit crazy and somewhere in the middle of that I figured out that I wanted to be in Faker again.”
A little over a year later, Hudson confirmed with fans that the Faker reunion was no joke stating that they were truly back. Since the announcement, Hudson and the band have been working on Enjoy Your Problems and single “Comet” dropped in 2025, and both “Partner In Crime” and “Nightmare’s Coming Back” in 2026, officially marking the return of the band.
Their latest album, Enjoy Your Problems, is a record about facing inertia (lack of activity or interest, resistance to change, or unwillingness to make an effort to do anything), attempting love, and risking survival.
The album includes 10 tracks, including previously released singles “Comet”, “Partner In Crime”, and “Nightmare’s Coming Back”. It is experimental, edgy, and emotional, taking the listeners on a well-lived journey.
The song “Frida” starts with a brightly EQed (Equalization, adjustment of volume level of a frequency) high hat or snare, beachy acoustic guitar, and “oh”s and “ah”s. During the chorus, there are delayed backing vocals making it sound fuller with lyrics “don’t accept these waves and storms they’re not perfect like you / They all just wash away once they rattle your bones” reassuring listeners that our troubles eventually fade with time. Throughout the song, we learn about Frida with lyrics “Frida, taught me the things that I couldn’t know / she had her way with me” and “Frida / she was my heroine”, but is “Frida” a person or is she a metaphor for growth.
“Nightmare’s Coming Back”, starts with chirping birds and heavy breathing, followed by an acoustic guitar and spoken word poetry. The lyrics speak about losing control, alluding to being high on what I assume is shrooms with lyrics “and the swamp was thick with hysteria”, “you’re wrapped up in vines and mess” which sounds like “you’d have to been poisonous” in the track, and my favorite line “I’m stuck, I’m stuck, and I’m becoming a tree”.
With ominous guitar and distant vocals, the song is a true fever dream. When listening to the song for the first time, I felt like I was running through a forest, going in circles seeing the same trees, vines, and shrubs over and over again. Maybe this was the adventure in 2020 Hudson was talking about.
You might mistake the beginning of the next song for your ringtone. With lyrics “who’ll take some of the risk”, “someone who’ll try and catch me when I fall”, and “in my head im getting struck with an arrow” the song “Partner In Crime” is about falling in love and being with someone that matches your action packed life and understands you.
“Nothing Else Here” has a very cinematic opening, starting with a shaker and the sound of a door creaking open and a great stereo field with a guitar slide ringing from the left to right. Like in “Frida” the crash is brightly EQed, but in “Nothing Else Here” the crash overpowers the rest of the song, making the song a bit unbalanced during lyrics in the chorus “nothing else here / will come between us / nothing else here / get in our way”. As a listener, and artist myself, the crash distracts me from the rest of the song, (kind of like how ADHD works) catching me off guard. With a bit more balance, I and listeners would be able to hear the vocals more. But this also works well as a contrasting moment with the lyrics “nothing else here / will come between us” and hearing a huge clashing sound coming between Hudson’s voice and the listener.
The last song on the track “Heavens” concludes our journey with Enjoy Your Problems. The song reminds me of “Creep” by Radiohead, and is my favorite song on the album. It is soft, melodic, and has a beautiful piano motif throughout. The vocals are raw and there is this sense of uncertainty throughout the song. After the lyrics “as the heavens fall apart” there is a key change at 2:55 with lyrics “I’m with you at the door / of the great unknown” this is an immaculate use of a key change showing a difference in setting and feel of the song.
Though we have reached the “Heavens” with Enjoy Your Problems, I am sure there will be more to come. I just hope they don’t go on another fifteen-year hiatus and that this is really the second coming of Faker!
Enjoy Your Problems Out is out September 4th on all platforms via Mandatory Music.
The Indy Review 