RVG’s “A Quality Of Mercy” is a much-needed plea for kindness

Melbourne-based band RVG's new single is a broadside at the people who leave ignorant and disrespectful comments under online news stories. You already know the type. The ones that leave you despairing for humanity and wondering who hurt them. On "A Quality Of Mercy," vocalist Romy Vager (the band's initials stand for Romy Vager Group), puts it simply: "Staring at the ceiling, feeling numb. Thinking of the readers of the Herald Sun."

Her literate and witty lyrics, teamed with earworm melodies, call to mind both The Fall and Courtney Barnett. Together with her bandmates, seen playing to an empty ballroom in the video premiering above, RVG creates a similarly idiosyncratic and knotty mix of hook-filled indie rock. Speaking to The FADER via email, Vager explained that the song was prompted by a major news story in her home country.

"It was loosely inspired by the executions of Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran in 2015 and how angry I was that a lot of middle class Australians thought that the death penalty for drug charges was a fair punishment. A lot of people were writing things like 'Well if you do the time, you do the crime' in the comments section of news articles. I wanted to challenge those dangerous right wing idioms and stress the need for perspective and empathy in what is very quickly becoming a much meaner world."

RVG release their debut album, also titled A Quality Of Mercy, via Our Golden Friend / Island Records on October 20. Check out their video above.