CHEAP-YEAR is the most ambitious project yet from Australian garage punk artist CHEAP-SKATE! a year long creative burn consisting of weekly releases across all of 2026, all written, recorded, produced and released entirely independently.
Built as a live creative experiment, CHEAP-YEAR rejects the traditional album cycle in favour of consistency. Songs aren’t stockpiled or over polished, they’re released in real time, allowed to breathe, connect, evolve (and fail) in public. Each track stands on its own while feeding into a much larger body of work that documents risk, growth and relentless output as it happens.
The project collates into quarterly “Volumes,” each marking a distinct chapter in sound, visuals and collaborators. Across the year, CHEAP-YEAR pulls in artists, producers and scene shapers from Australia and overseas, expanding what begins as a solo mission into a constantly shifting creative ecosystem.
CHEAP-YEAR turns process into headline. It prioritises consistency over perfection, movement over comfort, and community over mystery. Fans, media and industry aren’t just hearing the music, they’re watching it take shape week by week, Volume by Volume.
Backed by multiple Australian tours throughout the year and international dates in the works, CHEAP-YEAR positions CHEAP-SKATE at the sharp end of modern DIY music… loud, obsessive, independent and impossible to ignore.
Truly a soon to be household name.
Speaking about the inspiration for embarking on CHEAP-YEAR, artist Blaike Murphy said:
“I basically just wanted to learn how to write, mix, and master start to finish because I write so, so much music but I’m too broke to go get it done professionally. CHEAP-YEAR is about as DIY as you can get. I was never taught music so I figured this is my 10,000 hours of figuring it out, I still don’t even know what chord is what.
Doing the “standard” campaigns of long rollouts for songs that were written months, if not years ago is painful. I just wanna get it out there whenever I make it, and now I can! A lot of people told me not to do this, that I’d burn out and that I’d oversaturate myself… but I’m doing it anyways.”
“Imagine Mac Demarco & Tame Impala one-man DIY with King Gizzards output but sonically sitting somewhere between FIDLAR and Skegss”
