Adam Johnstone, lead guitarist for Australian energy pop group Romero, died on October 17. He was 32. Johnstone’s brother and bandmate Dave shared the information in an Instagram submit, revealing that Adam had been residing with most cancers since 2019. Dave wrote that Adam “handed away peacefully at residence surrounded by his household and buddies.” Discover his full assertion beneath.
Adam Johnstone grew up in Melbourne, Australia, and started enjoying music together with his brother Dave after they had been children. Inspired by their mother and father, they jammed of their basement collectively from a younger age, with Dave gravitating towards drums and Adam selecting up the electrical guitar. Their early repertoire largely included covers of Blink-182 and Rancid, as they advised Pitchfork’s Evan Minsker final yr throughout a Rising interview.
“Our mum was truly an artwork and music trainer as effectively. She was all the time very supportive of us, however even earlier than we type of selected devices that we ended up enjoying with, we’d be banging on crap and enjoying on keyboards and all that type of stuff,” Adam advised Pitchfork. “We had ended up being at the college that mother taught at for a number of years as effectively. So the artwork and music room was our playhouse too. Once we completed, we may simply go and decide up something we needed to and play it.”
Adam and Dave shaped Romero in 2018 together with singer Alanna Oliver, bassist Justin Tawil, and rhythm guitarist Fergus Sinclair. Adam and Dave had beforehand performed within the band Summer season Blood, and had been contemplating sitting out further musical initiatives after that band broke up. Then, Adam met Oliver, who performed him one in every of her demos on her cellphone. Gobsmacked by her voice, Adam determined to start out a brand new band.
“When Romero occurred, all of the sound that we had got here actually pure and all of it felt loads simpler,” Adam advised Pitchfork. “It simply felt prefer it was meshing collectively loads higher. There wasn’t any strain to jot down a sure method. We had been simply figuring all the things out. That in itself was thrilling to be round.”
Romero issued their debut studio album Flip It On! final spring; Adam Johnstone’s lead guitar riffs are a defining trait of the file. In saying his brother’s dying, Dave Johnstone summed up his distinctive sound thusly: “It goes with out saying that he was an extremely gifted musician. He knew how one can write a fucking riff. I had a entrance row seat to all of his songwriting, and it all the time had such a haunting, nostalgic and tortured magnificence to it, like he was relaying a lot ache via the one method he may talk it, channeling it via a tunnel of affection and letting it bleed via his guitar.”