BAND OF THE WEEK: Albert Fish
One of the stalwarts of the Portuguese punk scene celebrates their 30th anniversary
A lot has changed (and mostly for the worst!) in the world since 1995, the year a little Portuguese band decided to name themselves after a serial killer and play punk rock. Even the band itself has gone through countless line-up changes. However, in their case, fortunately, they only seem to get better. It helps that they have always been anchored by the steady presence of their leader, bassplayer Luís Rattus, one of the most iconic figures of the country’s punk scene. He is and has been in multiple cool bands, including the official support band for the country’s current top football club, Sporting Clube de Portugal, he’s the founder of three record labels (Zerowork Records, Combate Brutal and Discos Caveira), he is basically the dude for Portuguese punk rock. Throughout the rocky trajectory of Albert Fish, in terms of personnel at least, he has been able to nevertheless keep a remarkable stability in the band, their melodic yet furious approach to punk rock never really wavering, as well as the social protest ethos they always maintain. Besides, the line-up has actually been kind of stable for the last few years - firebrand vocalist Inês Menezes has been a particular shot of extra energy ever since she joined -, so probably maturity brings some good things too. Just like it’s always been, an Albert Fish show is a place where you’ll go to have fun, sing along, get a little pit started, but you’ll be singing along to issues that actually matter too. It’s a complete package, and that’s why we’re celebrating the band’s 30th anniversary here now. Here’s a little clip from a celebratory gig they had in April:
Just for the hell of it, here’s them in 1996, different times, different line-up, but a similar ferocious energy:
Though they’ve had numerous releases over the years, in true underground punk style, with a bunch of splits and live albums and other smaller releases, the actual full-length records have been few and far between - ‘Strongly Recommended’ (2002), ‘News From The Front’ (2009), ‘Still Here!’ (2014) and last year’s ‘Save The Planet, Kill Yourself‘ remain as the cornerstones of the band’s output, and unlike a lot of bands within this style, they actually take quite good care of the quality of the studio albums, they all hold up pretty well to this day, both soundwise and in terms of the depth of songwriting. ‘Save The Planet…’ has actually quietly become one of my favourites since the release, so it’s not a bad place to start if you’d like to get into them:
As you can see, from ‘Fuck The Government’ to ‘Fuck Gender Roles’, not to mention ‘Social Media Influenza’, they’re anything but subtle in the sledgehammer-like delivery of their message, and you know what, that’s sort of what we need right now in that department. The title track even starts with an awesome George Carlin sample, and that should be all you need to know to immediately listen to a band. This record is awesome enough to be a celebration unto its own, honestly, but since 2025 is the proper anniversary year, Albert Fish had a little gift for fans and they’ve just put out a limited edition compilation of rarities, cover songs, compilation tracks and other little lost songs they’ve accumulated over the years, so that’s another great excuse for this little homage of ours here at TDM, as if we needed any more excuses, right? It’s also a great introduction to the band, as they actually do play some of these songs live, and there’s also the opportunity to listen to them cover songs by both local legends (Peste & Sida, Mata-Ratos, Simbiose) or international ones, with their kickass version of Doom’s ‘Consumed To Death’. Give it a spin, and then go read the great chat we had with Rattus himself, right after this.
‘XXX’ is now out via Zerowork Records.
’Save The Planet, Kill Yourself’ is now out via Zerowork Records / Raging Planet / Firecum Records (vinyl), Infected Records / Raging Planet (CD), Fightback Records (tape) and it’s distributed in Europe by Contra Records.
You can find Albert Fish on Bandcamp, Instagram, Facebook and YouTube.
“The secret to our longevity is that we don’t depend on success, we don’t have expectations for anything.“
— Luís Rattus
Tell us a little more about the new compilation, ‘XXX’. What was the idea behind releasing it now? And by the way, do avoid googling for “albert fish xxx”. Trust me.
Luís Rattus: Ahahahah!! Well, obviously this XXX doesn’t have any pornographic connotations, nor straight edge ones. It’s just the 30 years of the band, and ‘XXX’ celebrates that round number. It has a few rare songs, some of them hard to find in a physical format, that have been taken from splits, EPs, compilations, tribute albums and even some alternative versions. It’s a little treat for collectors and for ourselves too.
Do you think you might give some of these songs a little more space in the line setlists, now that they’ve been solidified like this?
Rattus: We actually already play, or at least have played, a few of them. But yeah, we don’t exclude that possibility for some of them, since we like to refresh the setlist every now and then. Some others are a little outside our usual thing and are on the record mostly for curiosity value. Stuff like Albert Fish playing crust with our friend Mosgo on vocals, or crazy covers of Mário o Trovador with Serralha improvising.
Over the years, you guys have had periods of great activity, alternating with some others where things seemed a little paused. What’s the current status of the band for you, do you still see it as a priority?
Rattus: It never really stopped being a priority or to have its importance, even during times when other projects became more prominent and gained more notoriety. Of course, it’s been many years steering this ship, and there were times when I left Albert Fish kind of on autopilot and took that time to do other things that give me a lot of pleasure, be it on a musical level, or on an editorial level with my labels. Right now the band is very healthy and it is in fact a big priority. We are recording a new album and we’re already quite ahead on it, I would love for it to still be out this year, to really celebrate the 30 years in style. When ‘Save The Planet, Kill Yourself’ came out, we made it a point to play absolutely everywhere to promote it. Right now we are being a little more selective with live shows, but obviously we haven’t stopped playing. Both things give us a hell of a thrill, both the studio and the stage.
How do you actually measure the reception ‘Save The Planet, Kill Yourself’ has had, now with a few months’ of hindsight? Was it within what you expected?
Rattus: We’ve had excellent feedback, we can’t complain because the reviews were wonderful. Good reviews and a good reception of the album on the live setting as well. We’ve also noticed that on the last few shows some curious new people have shown up.
The political and social message you guys bring is inseparable from the music, in your case. With the continuous turning towards stupidity that our political landscape, both in Portugal and in most other countries, has suffered in the last few years, do you feel the importance of yours and other bands like yours becomes bigger? Is there a sense of responsibility in trying to fight this? And also, do you feel a different reception of people to your message during these recent years?
Rattus: Fortunately we are not the only ones, there are still many fighting companions, many other bands that cannot dissociate punk from the political and social struggles. I would say 90% of our lyrics attempt to make a stand about something, be it racism, fascism, homophobia, xenophobia on a wider scale, like the greed of governments, immigration policies, the business of war, the pharma industry or the fucking bullfights. Our lives might not be partisan, but it’s surely politics and our actions that reflect who we are and what we are doing here. Within our scene we haven’t noticed a big difference regarding people’s reactions to what we sing about, except perhaps an even bigger empathy towards our message.
There’s a big list of Albert Fish ex-members (Discogs, for example, lists fourteen people), and obviously you are the only standing member of the original lineup. However, the last few years have seemed to have brought a bigger stability, what to you attribute this to?
Rattus: I actually don’t know the exact number of people who have been in Albert FIsh, but it’s surely more than those fourteen. Well, Alex left the band after the recording of ‘Strongly Not Recommended’, and Daniel is back, after having been in the band before, during the ‘News From The Front’ days. Since Paulão rarely plays live with us because of his work, even if he’s still part of the band for the writing and recording, we felt the need to include another guitar, mostly for not losing power on stage, so Lúcio has joined us. So we are now the Iron Maiden of punk rock, with three guitarists! [laughs] The people in this line-up have a great connection with each other, and while that might sound like a cliché, I think the band has never been healthier or more solid.
If you had to pick some of the high points of these 30 years with Albert Fish, what would you highlight? Are there still any specific goals that you would like to achieve?
Rattus: It’s a little hard to summarise the high points and also subjective. But we’ve had unforgettable landmarks for sure, like our tour of Brazil with Garotos Podres, going on the road with Varukers, the European tours, being the soundtrack for the Australian leg of the skate world cup, being distributed by the legendary Rough Trade or doing splits with mythical names like Klasse Kriminale. We don’t really have goals to achieve, to be honest we never did. Aside from the message we think is relevant to push through, the important thing for us is having fun on the road with the friends we make along the way. In fact, I think the secret to our longevity is that we don’t depend on success, we don’t have expectations for anything. We are honest towards ourselves and we only do what we like and what gives us pleasure.
As everyone knows, you are a member of Supporting, the support band for Sporting Clube de Portugal. For a long time, both the band and all of us Sportinguistas kept supporting the club even during the years when we didn’t win much. How has it been, then, to live through these last five years or so, in that capacity of “the club’s band”, when we are finally getting our reward with multiple important titles?
Rattus: It has been amazing, not only to live this glory after the resilience of many years, but also to collaborate a little bit in our own way to getting these results. It’s undescribable, the feeling of entering the stadium and listening to our songs, it’s an immense source of pride to have parents thanking us for influencing and helping their kids become passionate about the Sportinguista ideal and participate actively in the club and its activities. Take a little bit of Sporting to all corners of Portugal, where we are constantly called by the various delegations. As our drummer Branco says, we don’t play football, but these are the goals we score, it’s our way to help the club. It’s fantastic, to feel the recognition of the club itself as an institution, and of its associates and supporters. It’s incredible and we are always speechless when we receive the kind of awards the we have gotten, including the Stromp award. In the end.. everything has been worth it!
Finally, would you like to let us know about some cool upcoming news from your other bands and your record labels too?
Rattus: Okay, as far as labels go, I just put out the new Dr. Frankenstein album on vinyl, they are the greatest reference of Portuguese surf punk. A new single from Komintern Sect, legendary band in the French streetpunk scene, is currently in the factory. Over at Combate Brutal, the label I run with my mate Sandro, we just put out the new Maloio full-length. As for bands, aside from a new surprise project that will be revealed soon, I’m recording a new EP with Atlantes, and soon I will start recording new songs for Horda, meant for a split with Brutal Siegers. And the new Albert Fish album too, of course.
A lion’s salute - we go for three! 🦁
Rattus: Sporting Sempre!
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