Herd Immunity rubbing shoulders with You Am I and re-igniting the sound of Oasis

It's a popular opinion that the Berlin Chair and Heavy Heart hit-makers never achieved the commercial success Tim Rogers' songwriting deserved - unlike contemporaries Silverchair and Powderfinger - despite having three ARIA No.1 albums with Hi-Fi Way, Hourly Daily and #Record.

But several bands who enjoyed a brush with You Am I became global superstars.

In 2001, just months before their seminal debut album Is This It was released, New York garage-rockers The Strokes supported You Am I at Sydney's Enmore Theatre following the late cancellation of fellow Big Apple band The Mooney Suzuki.

"I'd read about [The Strokes' debut] The Modern Age EP and I bought it on a whim," Rogers reflected on Double J 19 years later. "I went back to my hotel room and listened to it.

"As we jumped in the van to drive out to a show, I said to the rest of the band, 'Have a listen to this'. We had a listen and said 'Yeah, we'll get in contact with them'."

Less than six months later, The Strokes were one of the world's hottest bands.

Then in 2008 a little psych-rock band from Perth, called Tame Impala supported You Am I on their national tour, which included a show at Newcastle's Cambridge Hotel.

Within a couple of years Kevin Parker and his bandmates were arguably the biggest Australian indie band of the past 15 years.

Emerging Newcastle rock band Herd Immunity are hoping You Am I's magic touch rubs off on them when they support Rogers & co at King Street on November 17.

The three-piece of Jewells brothers Tom (guitar, bass, vocals), 20, and Tim Toft (vocals, bass, guitar), 17, and Lambton High's Zane Carolan (drums), 17, have been regularly gigging around Newcastle for the past 18 months when they caught the attention of Big Apachee's Aaron Philpott.

Philpott has since become the band's "unofficial official manager".

"We got some material together and he [Philpott] showed You Am I and they really liked our material and thought we were well suited," Tom says.

The Toft brothers started writing songs and playing together in 2020, inspired by their shared love of legendary Manchester band Oasis, who were led by the tempestuous brothers Noel and Liam Gallagher.

"My and Tom's experience was basically walking around the house with dad chucking on Definitely Maybe or (What's The Story) Morning Glory and hearing it in the background, and thinking 'that sounds alright'," Tim says.

"We never took any notice of it until later."

Tom says it wasn't just the music of Oasis they fell in love with, it was also the "fashion, the haircuts, the guitar playing."

The crunching guitars, bright melodies and the Liam Gallagher-style vocals, are heavily present in Herd Immunity's first three singles Dead By The Daylight, Fracture and Before I Go.

Carolan joined the Toft brothers in 2022, and while he discovered Oasis later on, he's also become a major fan of the Wonderwall and Don't Look Back In Anger stars.

"I got into them when I was 14 when they were bringing out the whole Knebworth 96 live album," Carolan says. "I remember watching the doco and when that album came out I pretty much studied it. That was my textbook for the summer holidays."

While Herd Immunity borrow their sound from Oasis and are fronted by brothers, the Toft boys are more chilled than the famously volatile Gallaghers.

"I don't think we'll be as bad as the Gallagher brothers," Tom says. "I can't see us hitting each other with cricket bats. Which is good. I'd say our relationship is healthy."

Back in the mid-90s You Am I also supported Oasis overseas and Rogers has interviewed Noel Gallagher for his Double J Liquid Lunch program.

Tom says the You Am I gig will be Herd Immunity's greatest opportunity yet.

"For us this will be the biggest gig we've done so far," he says. "Sometimes we play to five people in a pub and sometimes we play to 20 people in a pub.

"Hopefully there will be a solid 500 to 600 people in the one room, so that's definitely branching out."

Herd Immunity have written a batch of new material, which they say moves beyond Oasis to incorporate Australian pub-rock and surf-rock influences too. The plan is to record a debut EP at The Grove studios on the Central Coast over the summer.

"There's three main corners we touch," Carolan says. "We like to bang our heads, we like the surf and we like England in the '90s."

Herd Immunity support You Am I at the King Street Bandroom on November 17.