Australian colloquial term for methylated spirits — denatured alcohol used as a solvent and fuel but also historically consumed by people experiencing extreme poverty or substance dependence.
Australian colloquial term for methylated spirits — denatured alcohol used as a solvent and fuel but also historically consumed by people experiencing extreme poverty or substance dependence. The word is practical in Australian English for the product itself, but it carries a darker connotation in discussions of homelessness and addiction. Often heard in both mundane and more serious social contexts.
Add your own interpretation of "metho".
Aussie and Kiwi vocabulary — bogan, daggy, brekkie, sheila, bach, jandals — the whole Antipodean lexicon, including outback dialect, surf and beach culture, and Sydney/Melbourne street slang.
See all Australian & NZ slang slang on Slangora.
Browse all slang words starting with M.
(slang, Australia) Methylated spirit.
A vivid Nigerian slang term for illicitly brewed or bootleg alcohol — the kind of rough, unregulated moonshine that hits hard and unpredictably, as if something feral is trapped inside the bottle waiting to be unleashed. The phrase captures both the danger and the wild energy of homemade spirits, products that can range from harsh but harmless to genuinely toxic. It's street-level poetry for a real social phenomenon.
Informal slang, used primarily in Australian and British English, for a heavy drinker or alcoholic. A boozehead is someone who drinks too much, too often — the person at every gathering who's already had too many before the event properly starts. The word is blunt and not particularly sympathetic, though it's often used with weary affection rather than genuine hostility. It belongs to a long tradition of booze-related insult words in Australian slang, where the drinking culture and the language around it are both very well developed.
He kept a bottle of metho in the shed for cleaning the brushes after painting.
(Australia, colloquial) Methylated spirits.
"metho" means: Methylated spirits.. This is informal slang, common in casual speech, texting and social media, but not appropriate for school work, applications or professional settings. There is no real cause for concern in itself; it is everyday peer vocabulary. If your child uses it, a light comment about audience and register is usually enough — no need to escalate. Context, more than the word, tells you whether to follow up.
"metho" means: Methylated spirits.. Register: informal slang, fine in casual conversation, texting and social media but not in academic essays, business writing or formal speech. A common non-native mistake is to use the word in the wrong register, or to assume one fixed meaning when it is actually polysemous; always check the surrounding register and the audience before producing it yourself. In formal writing, prefer a neutral synonym or a short descriptive phrase, and use this word only when you have heard or read it being used naturally in a comparable context.
Scottish and Tyneside slang for being extremely drunk — not just tipsy, but comprehensively, embarrassingly hammered. Mortalled implies the kind of drunk where you're barely functional, possibly sliding down walls or needing friends to navigate you home. It's a vivid, punchy word that perfectly captures a night that got well out of hand, and it's warmly familiar to anyone who's spent time in Newcastle or Edinburgh pub culture.