Where's the Pope? Last Beers, Last BBQ, Last Chance
About
After 40 years and a million beers, Adelaide’s legendary punk thrashers Where’s The Pope? are hanging up their cassocks with an epic farewell at Lion Arts Centre in December.
Where’s The Pope? first erupted onto local stages in 1986, their high-energy skatepunk and blistering vinyl debut Straight Edge Holocaust gaining a devoted following across music pubs and surf clubs.
Follow-up LP Sunday Afternoon Barbecues, with its anthemic title track and frantic We Want Your Beer (both on a list of SA’s Top 20 best songs of all time) cemented WTP?’s reputation and captured a time and spirit still dear to many fans.
After many more shows including Big Day Outs plus two more releases, Where’s The Pope? left the stage in 2000.
They returned in 2008 for a sold-out reunion gig and then took a 15-year vow of silence, before fan prayers
were answered when the band announced a rapidly sold out reunion gig at The Gov in November 2023.
The reformed Where’s The Pope? didn’t disappoint, with frontman Frank P in gold papal finery leading a fast, tight and heavy band in a memorable show which led the faithful to ask for more.
Clarity Records then re-released all four WTP? titles on vinyl, prompting a second sold-out Gov gig a year later in November 2024.
The band played the Nice Day To Go To The Club festival in February 2025, and topped it off with a sizzling set on the main stage at the 2026 Froth and Fury Fest.
WTP? are now leaving the stage for good - and they’re going out with a bang.
Five other bands will join them to celebrate the end of an era with a night of fast and furious music, including raucous up-and-comers Sacrificial Larynx, midcoast thrashers Steal Capz and local punk pioneers Perdition, while brutal 90s hardcore outfit Price Of Silence are reforming just for this special event. And not to mention a very special Mystery Band…
