Shihad Endures Through Struggles and Triumphs

In a story for ABC News, Dan Condon looks back at some of the key musical and personal moments in New Zealand band Shihad’s career.

In 1991, just three years after first getting together, this shabby group of teenagers was given the kind of opportunity dreams are made of, Condon writes.

“We were quite lucky early on that we were asked to support AC/DC when we were just kids,” vocalist Jon Toogood told Double J’s Inside the Big Day Out podcast in 2019. “So, we had had a taste for arena rock straight away.”

The quality was there from the start: put on Shihad’s first two records Churn and Killjoy, and you’ll understand how the band went on to be such a remarkably successful group.

Shihad’s story is long and fascinating, and it’s not over yet. The band’s tenth record Old Gods is out now, and it sees them sounding as angry and as vital as ever.

And big. They still sound really, really big.

Original article by Dan Condon, ABC News, October 7, 2021.

Illustration by Katherine Brickman.