Frontman Charlie Steen talk touring with Fontaines D.C, stage diving and why it’s more interesting to write songs about your mates
I’ve had this feeling before.
An inkling, a hint, a suspicion even. It’s that inimitable thing when you know you’ve seen something special. Your jaw locks. Eyes widen. Your mind becomes wholly consumed by this one thing unfolding in front of you.
It happened the first time when I saw Royel Otis at UniBar in Wollongong. There was a flicker, an ember of light that suggested promise. Like something was really going to happen. And sure enough, it did.
The second time it happened was just the other night. At Sydney’s Metro Theatre, a place that’s as small as it is significant, nestled right in the heart of the city. The crowd was thick with Fontaines D.C. shirts and an almost absurd amount of vape smoke. But it wasn’t the crowd that made the night—no, it was the band on stage. South London’s own Shame.
Bare-chested, suspenders hanging loosely from his shoulders, lead singer Charlie Steen paraded around the stage like a gladiator at battle. He appeared like a figure cut from the same cloth as Birthday Party-era Nick Cave. At one point, he threw himself into the crowd—diving in as if they were a pool. The audience caught him, kept him aloft, and he kept singing. The whole thing felt both chaotic and natural. He wasn’t playing at being something. He just was something. Ferocious, alive, unpredictable. Like a stray cat that had just been brought out of a cage.
The next day when we talk at the Lord Wolseley Hotel in Ultimo the contrast was staggering. Here he was, just another 20-something enjoying the Sydney sun with his mates, a glass of wine in hand. He looked like the kind of guy you’d see lounging on a park bench, chatting about life like he had been chilling the night before. No suspenders. No wild-eyed intensity. Just a bloke from South London, kicking back.
“It was really good, really fun,” he says, almost offhandedly, recalling the night before.
I raise an eyebrow. The guy who dived into the crowd and performed atop speakers was now the epitome of casual ease and London charm. What on earth.
So, I ask: Do you embody a character when you’re on stage? He pauses for a second.
“Yeah,” he says slowly, as if considering it. “It’s just an exaggeration of me. We started out in those small, independent venues in London, and it was always about that energy. And yeah, I’ve fallen down. But you get back up.”
It’s no surprise to hear that, it actually does makes sense. The music, the dive into the crowd—it’s all about maintaining that raw edge, even in front of a room full of strangers. That’s what they’ve always done. That’s what keeps them moving.
Shame are in Australia as part of a tour with their mates, Fontaines D.C. “We’ve known them for ages. Nine years, actually. We’re friends,” Steen says of Fontaines. “It’s nice to tour with friends.” It’s a simple truth, but it says a lot about the band’s approach: they’re in this together, not just as musicians but as people who have seen it all—from the cramped London venues to the wider world stage.
The last time Shame played in Australia was back in 2018, during the Laneway Festival. Since then, they’ve dropped two albums. Drunk Tank Pink, which was all post-punk energy and Talking Heads vibes, and Food for Worms, which they released in early 2023.
“Drunk Tank Pink was very much post-punk,” Steen says. “But Food for Worms—that’s different. We were listening to a lot of Blumfeld, Jeff Buckley. It’s more Americana, more introspective.”
I recall an article I read where Steen supposedly said he hated the term “post-punk.” He laughs when I bring it up. “Call us whatever you want,” he shrugs, unbothered. “It’s all just labels. The music’s the thing.”
It’s not just the sound that’s shifted. Food for Worms is darker, more emotional, like something that’s been scraped raw. The kind of album that feels personal, deeply so. It’s almost as if Steen has been forced to look inward, shedding some of the bravado and letting his own vulnerability leak out through the music.
The album’s cover art alone speaks volumes. Painted by the American artist Marcel Dzama, it’s an eerie, surreal depiction of five figures swimming in dotted wetsuits beneath a moonlit sky. It could belong in an art gallery, and in fact, it did—Steen recalls seeing it in a Mayfair gallery long before the album even dropped.
“Everything about this record happened naturally,” he says. “We wrote most of it in about three weeks. Six-Pack was the only one that existed before.”
Thematically, it’s not what you’d expect. No tired love songs, no breakup ballads. Instead, it’s about friendships. Those formative, sometimes messy relationships you forge in your twenties. “I was twenty-four, and there was a big shift in friendships for me,” he admits. And those friendships—those growing pains—are everywhere on Food for Worms.
And it makes sense. Shame isn’t some manufactured boy band. It wasn’t born out of a business plan or a marketing angle. It’s the product of friendship, of people who grew up together in South London, who shared their early days in the same corner of the city. “We started the band when we were teens,” Steen recalls. “I was 16, the others were 17. We grew up around Earlsfield and Brixton. We played our first show at The Green’s Head, a pub in Brixton.”
Looking ahead, Steen’s excited for what comes next. “We’ve finished our new album,” he says with a grin, clearly proud. And yes, he’s planning to keep the bare-chested suspenders look for the next round. “I’m definitely going to wear them more for the next campaign,” he jokes.
As our chat draws to a close, I can’t help but feel that my inkling was correct. Shame truly are the kind of band that make music you can believe in. It’s grubby. Warts and all. A bit uncomfortable and not always pretty but it is entirely truthful. And more than anything it’s nice to listen to. What more could you want from a band than that?
Shame are currently touring Australia and New Zealand with Fontaines D.C. They will also be performing their own side shows in Melbourne and Wellington. Tickets can be purchased here.
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