It’s a peaceful Sunday afternoon in Freo; the streets are sparsely lined with families strolling in the sun and couples enjoying quiet dates. As you approach the Buffalo Club, the sound of roaring guitar riffs and heavy drums call you inside to a small room upstairs. There, Perth’s hardcore community have gathered to watch local band Chalked perform and mosh. Hard.

Onstage is 19-year-old Junyi Thia. She’s the youngest one up there, and the only girl, but her stage presence is massive, and her talent is undeniable. Despite that, she tells me she often feels underestimated.

The come up

A self-taught guitarist, civil engineering student and owner of a hairless cat, Thia says she was introduced to hardcore music in her teenage years via the pure luck of the Spotify algorithm. She’s now in two bands, Chalked and Cicada. According to the music blog Rough Trade, hardcore is a music subculture that originated as a faster, harder form of punk in the late 1970s. Thia tells me the Perth hardcore community is small but strong, “like a big family”.

She spent a couple of years going to shows at The YHQ and becoming part of the tight-knit community. She remembers the first gig she ever attended; her friend got knocked in the face while moshing and left with a bloody nose. “It was hilarious,” she says. “Moshing hard is a way people show appreciation to the bands.”

In May 2025 Jake Alves-Vierira asked Thia to join his band Chalked just three days before their first show. She remembers how nervous she was going onstage after learning the set by ear so quickly.

The band’s drummer, Khan Power, recalls their first rehearsal with Thia, laughing about how she was playing loudly over the top of everyone without realising. He explains, “Jake was getting so frustrated,” but it turned out she was the perfect fit for the band.

Chalked is now signed to Loudmouth Records, a Boorloo record label created to give the West Coast’s alternative scenes the same love that the Eastern states were getting. And she hasn’t just played in Chalked, at one point, she was juggling performing and writing in three separate bands.

“Dude, I’m a bad bitch.”

Junyi Thia

It’s clear her band mates, all guys in their mid-twenties, think highly of her. On a couch backstage at the Buffalo Club Alves-Vierira tells me she’s the most technically skilled the band. The other band members nod in agreement.

“She makes me a better guitar player,” he says, “I feel like I’m growing because I know her.”

The tall long-haired guitarist explains he gets frustrated when people underestimate her.

Tuning out the feedback 

Alves-Vierira recalls a time when someone commented to him Thia didn’t know what she was doing while she was having problems with her lead. Thia tells us across the room she “would’ve fucking killed him” if she knew.

Thia says she’s used to people downplaying her talents. She’s one of the few women who’s active in Perth’s hardcore bands. She says one time she’d just come off stage after playing a huge guitar solo at alternative One Blood festival when someone told her she killed it on the bass. “People just assume you wouldn’t be playing lead.” 

Another time she says she was told she has “lead singer vibes,” adding it’s frustrating because nobody else in her band gets that kind of treatment. 

According to research by The Ohio State University, women in alternative music are significantly underrepresented compared to other genres. Thia says it was intimidating at first being around so many “old head” guys.

On stage at the Buffalo Club, she wears a hoodie and baggy pants. She says it’s easier if she dresses more like the guys in her band. “I always feel like people will take you less seriously if you’re girly and stuff.”

She says in future she wants to become more comfortable with presenting more femininely on stage, joking, “It’s not my fault I’m not a chopped old white dude.” 

A pillar in the community

In the hardcore community, accepting everyone in all walks of life is essential. Andy Kelly is the owner of Loudmouth Records and has been in the scene for 20 years. He tells me Thia is an essential part of Boorloo’s hardcore scene, and adds that it’s important for young girls and young kids coming through the scene to see someone who’s not male, not white, not your typical hardcore kid, doing what they’re doing to break through.

Kelly wants to encourage more kids to start bands and participate in the scene, crediting Thia and her band as being the next generation who will lead the subculture.

He recalls that when he first entered the scene, coincidentally in the exact same place Thia joined the scene, The YHQ in Leederville. He says the idea of girls in hardcore was unheard of, referred to like “a nice dream, but it’s not going to happen.” Now he says he thinks around 20% of band members in the broader alternative scene are female, but he hopes to get to a point where it’s 50/50.

Kelly remembers Thia’s first gig with Chalked where she learned the set in three days. He says there’s not many musicians who could pull that off. He calls it a miracle and adds that her guitar skills are of the highest calibre.

“I’ve been around for twenty years; she’s been around for three. So, there’s at least seventeen years of her doing better than I have. This is only the starting point for her.”

Andy Kelly

Everyone I spoke to in this community seems to share the sentiment that young people are important to this subculture, because it will die without them. Asked if she had a message she wanted to share, Thia replied: “If any more young people are reading this, come to shows and start more bands. Please!”

And Kelly, who’s seen and helped countless new talents in this community for two decades, added: “If you’re going to underestimate Junyi Thia. Don’t.”