Australian indie-rockers Gang Of Youths play bold-yet-brooding music akin to Alligator-era the National. They’ve garnered radio spins on both sides of the Atlantic, appearances at CMJ and SXSW, and gigs with Sky Ferreira, Smith Westerns, and MS MR among others, and new single “Benevolence Riots” suggests all that attention has been well-deserved. A steady rhythmic churn and a piercing guitar riff serve as the basis for a story sung in David Leaupepe’s melodious baritone. The frontman offered some background on the subject matter:

When I was 18 I fell in love with a girl who was really sick — in order for her to gain access to any kind of effective treatment she had to move back to her hometown a couple of years later and receive clinical care from specialists at a world-renowned facility. “Benevolence Riots” is about learning how to function with poise and evenness in spite of rapidly deteriorating psychological resilience and the crippling and perpetual anxiety of living away from the one person in the world who needs you the most. It’s about learning how to fight grief and the impending possibility of death with urgency and defiance.

Hear “Benevolence Riots” below.