Sticky Fingers have nabbed their first ever Number 1 debut on the Australian albums chart. The Sydney outfit’s Westway (The Glitter & The Slums) beat American indie favourite Bon Iver to the top spot and bested other new releases by the likes of Opeth, Banks, and Yellowcard.

Not only does this give Sticky Fingers their first Number 1 on the Aussie charts (the band’s previous album, Land Of Pleasure, came in at Number 3 in 2014), but it continues the incredible streak that local artists have been experiencing on the charts.

As we reported last month, Australian icon Nick Cave set an Australian chart record when he became the 15th Australian artist to hit the top of the albums chart this year. Cave helped break the record for most Aussie Number 1s in a single year, set back in 2013.

We recently caught up with the Sticky Fingers lads to discuss Westway (The Glitter & The Slums) and what went into making the album, which was recorded in Thailand following a period of personal turmoil for the band, who found themselves on the verge of splitting up.

“In going into Thailand, we tried to sober up and get healthy, but as a result of that I believe I was suffering from a form of withdrawal, and I got unwell for a bit, then I kind of went to hospital in Thailand to make sure everything was sweet,” Paddy Cornwall told Tone Deaf.

“I had a bit of a nervous breakdown, and there was this period where I wasn’t sleeping well, where I wasn’t feeling too well in the head, so I was going out into this field next to our villa, and I was lying on the grass, talking to stars.”

“I’m pretty sure I was trying to talk to David Bowie, because he died the day we started making the album.” The result of that psychic turmoil is what Tone Deaf reviewer Sean A’Hearn called the Newtown outfit’s best record yet.

Sean called the Stickys’s third full-length effort “an album that manages to capture the journey of a band of brothers who have had their fair share of rocky moments, but have made it through stronger for the experience”.

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