Five Band T-Shirts Anthony Albanese Should Wear To Annoy The Liberal Party

The Liberal Party has been in hot water this week, with Opposition Leader Sussan Ley launching an attack on Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, alleging that his wearing of a Joy Division t-shirt was antisemitic.

Ley, who in June explained that she added an extra s to her first name during her “rebel teenage years… I went through a punk phase,” per The Guardian, and has previously discussed her “punk rock past,” should be familiar with post-punk icons Joy Division.

But upon Albanese's return to Australia last week, donning the shirt, Ley took offence to the merchandise and, on Tuesday (28 October), described wearing it as a “profound failure of judgment” that failed “the basic tests of leadership.”

Ley also cited the well-known beginnings of Joy Division’s name—pulled from “a wing of a Nazi concentration camp where Jewish women were forced into sexual slavery”—and alleged that Albanese’s Unknown Pleasures tee contained an image “derived from hatred and suffering.”

Joy Division’s band name was inspired by a reference in Jewish writer and Holocaust survivor Yehiel De-Nur, also known by the pen name Ka-Tsetnik 135633’s novella, House of Dolls. They also featured a short excerpt from the novella in their 1978 song, No Love Lost.

With the ongoing discourse around Albo wearing a Joy Division t-shirt—a shirt many Gen X punks would own—we couldn’t help but come up with some more band t-shirts that he could wear to upset the Liberal Party.

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**MUDRAT hates rich c*nts**

If the innocuous Unknown Pleasures album cover is enough to upset the Opposition Leader, we support a more inflammatory t-shirt from Melbourne’s MUDRAT won’t exactly score the approval of the Liberal Party.

Calling back to MUDRAT’s incendiary song of the same name, 10% of profits from sales of the cropped tee will be donated to Sisters Inside, an Aboriginal-led independent community organisation based in Queensland. The initiative advocates for the human rights of women and girls in prison, as well as their families, plus provides services to address their individual needs.

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Lambrini Girls have a message for TERFS

English punk duo Lambrini Girls never shy away from their beliefs. Comprising Phoebe Lunny and Selin Macieira-Boşgelmez, the band have received critical acclaim for their cheeky debut album, Who Let The Dogs Out, earlier this year.

Their Fuck TERFS shirt takes aim at trans-exclusionary radical feminists. Lambrini Girls have consistently shown support for gender-affirming care for transgender youth and highlighted the rate of suicides among young transgender people.

Like the MUDRAT shirt, we’re guessing that inflammatory language probably upsets the Libs, and seeing how the Queensland Health Minister reinstated a ban on puberty blockers just hours after a Supreme Court judge overturned the freeze yesterday, this shirt is definitely not for them.

Lambrini Girls’ Fuck TERFs tee. Credit: Lambrini Girls webstore.

Midnight Oil’s ‘Sorry’ outfits

In 2000, Midnight Oil performed their 1987 hit single, Beds Are Burning, at the Sydney Olympics Closing Ceremony. During their time on stage, the Aussie rockers made the most out of the moment by inking the word “Sorry” on their outfits in protest against then-Prime Minister John Howard’s refusal to apologise to Australia’s First Nations people. A legendary moment in Australian music history, not so much for the former PM.

Any Tropical Fuck Storm shirt

The Melbourne experimental rock band have an interesting name, to say the least. And if the Unknown Pleasures album cover is offensive, then we suppose that garish Tropical Fuck Storm t-shirts are a no-go.

Tropical Fuck Storm t-shirt. Credit: Soundmerch webstore.

**How about Frenzal Rhomb’s twist on Unknown Pleasures?**

There are so many Frenzal Rhomb t-shirts we could include in this piece, but looking at the original context, this one was just too good to resist.