Live Review: ANIMAL COLLECTIVE, AFRICA HITECH

Palace Theatre

Though audience numbers seem lower than those of their last visit, and the mood more respectful that jubilant, it’s clear Animal Collective command a loyal following. Few of who are intrigued enough to arrive early for support act Africa HiTech; a duo working a laptop, turntables, a mixer and a small synth. Starting out by meshing soundscapes and soulful singing over some Kompakt style minimalist techno, we’re soon treated to a journey through 90s dance music, complete with 80s new wave sampling. Beats become more complex as bubbling synth lines and squelchy sine waves ride heavily compressed beats and occasional looped raps. It’s oddly nostalgic and incredibly infectious.

The crowd packs in as 9:45 approaches. Lights dim, chatter is replaced with cheers as radio samples ricochet and flickering saturated projections light the stage, lined with large inflatable glowing teeth and arching tentacles. The four members emerge to a rise in cheers and immediately begin tweaking dials, pushing buttons and gently drumming. Easing into Rosie Oh, the projections move from being vibrant patterns to cut-up nature documentaries and clips from bucolic animated films. Drummer Noah Lennox takes the lead vocals and his voice is unusually strong and clear. Keyboardist Avey Tare leads us through almost every other song in the set, from the ensuing Today’s Supernatural on; his vocals style tends more toward manic passion than guitarist Josh Dibb’s more grounded delivery and Lennox’s more varied expressiveness.

Recent single Honeycomb and most of latest album Centipede Hz get an airing, and though the crowd responds vocally, there is little physical involvement. Animal Collective show a near pathological fear of silence as songs segue into and out of each other, and disappear into patches of sprawling atonal and percussive chaos. These are gleefully disorientating at times, but just as often suffocating and meandering, a superfluity of ideas and their clumsy merging betrays a lack of editing that seems oddly appropriate for this age of three-hour movies. It’s a lack of rigour apparent in the songwriting too; many songs sound more like four people exploring a vague theme rather than a band fleshing out a song. Passages of fantastic loping polyrhythms underscore many of the newer songs (like Moonjock and Monkey Riches) but, unlike their finer moments, there seems to be no strong personality or theme, though the colour scheme of saturated red and fluro pink and green is bold and original. The appearance of older track Lion in a Coma wakes the crowd and its space, vocal harmonies and simpler rhythms stand in stark contrast. The same is true for 2009’s Brother Sport, which triggers an explosion of glee in the crowd, a feeling capitalized on by its extended rave-like outro and merge into set-closing thrill of Peacebone. Returning for an encore that features a new unnamed song, a boisterous take on My Girls and the Centipede Hz track Amanita the band leave us sated for another year and, it seems, another album.

Live Review: THE MORNING AFTER GIRLS

Ding Dong Lounge

In the five years since the Morning After Girls (aka the MAGs) left these shores for New York, economies have crumbled, styles have risen and fallen, yet the band have remained untouched. Though lineups have shifted, the core duo of Sacha Lucashenko and Marty Sleeman ensure the aesthetic remains the same. Time has, if anything strengthened and honed the band’s sound into one that transcends their oft-touted influences and renders them one of the best rock bands in the country. Ten years on the job will do that, and tonight’s show stands as the most recent proof.

In lieu of a support band the audience (most of whom seem to be ex-MAGs members) check their smart phones, push their hair out of their eyes and sip pints. No one seems under 30 and music, it’s safe to say, is taken very seriously here. Even as the room fills to near capacity, the mood is cautious and chatty.

The gig slides smoothly into action; incense is lit, soundscapes play over the PA and the band arrive to little fanfare. The spacey riff for opening song Corruption pulls attention toward the band and for the rest of the show, it’s hard to look away. The sound is huge; the drums punish, basslines swerve and buckle, the guitar riffs are singed with distortion. So far, so neo-psychedelic, but where the MAGs really show prowess and progress is with the vocal attack. Sleeman and Lucashenko’s voices blend, twist and spar against each other, giving an acrid edge to the warmth of their guitars and the keyboards of vital talent Johnny Livewire. Never sounding this powerful or coruscating, Death Processions, and the 90210-featured Alone render the audience a noisy, cheering mass. Though the band never acknowledge it, a triumphant homecoming is unfolding.

Psych-rock has long been the realm of lazy, effects-reliant guitarists who never need learn a barre chord to sound like the Brian Jonestown Massacre, and its current faddishness is no doubt partly down to this simplicity. Conversely, it’s one of the hardest genres in which to sound individual and inspire affection. However the MAGs are smarter and their songs better constructed than many of their peers, national or international, and there is no such bland chording here. Older songs like Shadows Evolve and The General Public get whoops of recognition while newer ones sound even better; layered, powerful and immediate, they couldn’t be written by anyone else. The encore of a blistering Who is They? and the near-pastoral version of There’s A Taking leave the audience far too happy for a group of people wearing so much black.

Though there’s no danger of the group disappearing into the fresh batch of bands pushing the guitar-chord-as-crashing-wave sound, the MAGs have made their biggest step toward perfecting this oft-abused style and with news of a new album due later this year, it’s good to have them back.

Live Review: ESG, NO ZU, TERRIBLE TRUTHS

HiFi Bar

With the heat sweltering outside, the cavernously empty interior of the HiFi Bar is soon brought down a few degrees by an icy blast of bracing post punk from local trio Terrible Truths. Bereft even of chords, the band’s stripped down sound is filled out with a twin vocal attack, busy drumming and brash attitudes. With the aesthetic of the Raincoats and the accurate simplicity and drive of Love of Diagrams, the band play as if they’re being chased, a fear of silence or slowing down drives every song. It’s a fantastic show and bodes well for future releases.

An equally excellent choice for support and also sounding as though they’re beamed in from 1981, NO ZU are the most kinetic band in town. Each member of the sextet plays accurate and simple motifs that spiral in and out of time in a captivating way, though songs are interchangeable they prove there are still variations on funk in 4/4 left unplayed. Songs often sound like uncontrolled breakdowns, in danger of getting lost but with a whip crack of timbale everything is brought together. This is what tightness looks like.

The buzz about ESG’s live-to-air at RRR yesterday has helped crank the atmosphere in the now-packed room from buoyant to excitably hyperactive. To the sound of Tom Tom Club’s Wordy Rappinghood the band walk out waving happily. ‘How you doin' Melbourne?’ grins singer Renee Scroggins over the near deafening cheers of the crowd, ‘this is a song called Dance’. With powerhouse drummer Valerie and percussionist Marie, the Scroggins’ are one of the most heard and least celebrated bands in history. The music itself is some of the simplest dance music ever released - drums, bass, percussion and minimalist vocals - yet it’s so effective it becomes instructive, and also explains why they were (and are) sampled so widely; they got it right.

Their classic and much-sampled UFO follows and includes the only use of guitar. Percussion drives the songs; dual tambourines, vibraslap and copious use of congas and cowbells are the only sounds to flesh out the massive bass and powerhouse drumming. Every introduction is met with deafening cheers, Time Shift, The Beat, I Feel Tonight and the almighty anthem to leaving bad relationships Closure, all cause such a burst of positivity amongst the crowd that this gig quickly becomes the happiest of all 300 plus gigs this reviewer has been to since writing for this publication. It’s phenomenal just how strong the effect of this music and the sight of these women playing it are. Further testaments to danceable simplicity follow My Love For You, You're No Good and Moody are dispatched with joyous precision. An encore of You Make No Sense elicits a brief stage invasion by dancers and the smiles on the faces of the band as they’re brought out for a second encore seal this as being one of the finest gigs in eons. All this and they didn’t even play their best song.

CD Review: YO LA TENGO - Fade

Matador

By the time a band release their 13^th album in their 29^th year of existence, there is every reason to think all they wanted to say has been said, and something else is more worthy of your attention. In most cases, you’d be right, in the case of Yo La Tengo, no. Not by a long shot.

Fade is it’s fair to say, one of the best albums of their very lengthy and surprisingly stable career. Though more down-at-heal than their most heralded releases, there are enough moments here like the clattering euphoria of closing Before We Run with its stinging string bursts and Georgia Hubley’s sleep-spoken lyrics, to remind you of how great they can be, and are. Throughout, the careful layering and texturing of songs, hidden in their apparent simplicity, is something wholly their own and even more notable than on their last release, 2009’s Popular Songs.

Seemingly influenced more by the band’s brace of film scores (Shortbus, Old Joy, Adventureland) than the guitar histrionics that epitomised the band’s last show in Melbourne, there is a delicate and sensitive quality to many of the songs. They only cut loose once here, on the 90s-indie rock throwback of Paddle Forward, but it’s a thee-minute Pavement-esque burst of brilliance you want to put on repeat.

In interviews leading up to it’s release lead singer and guitarist Ira Kaplan termed Fade a return to the themes of their two most celebrated albums 1997’s I Can Hear The Heart Beating as One and 2000’s …and Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out and of course, he’s right. Their peculiar brand of joyous nostalgia is here glowing like an amp valve, yet neither of these albums had the despondency that threads these ten songs together or its bouts of sparseness. More than anything though, there is a richness that still finds room for spontaneity that hasn’t been present since those records. Asking John McEntire to produce seems an obvious but smart choice (breaking a 19-year relationship with Roger Moutenot), and one that keeps the sprawl under seven minutes.

Opener Ohm is YLT at their Velvets-aping finest, all churning chords spectral harmonies and a percussion-driven rhythm loop. Stupid Things is one of the few songs here that hints at the band fans fell in love with so long ago, and it too reveals hidden complexities on multiple listens. Unlike Superchunk’s critic-uniting blazing return to form in 2011, Fade is more of a humble offering, but one that is richly rewarding.

Live Review: NEW GODS, MONTERO, JESSICA SAYS

Northcote Social Club

Though it’s been a while since the storming World Without Men single, Jessica Says (aka cellist/vocalist/songwriter Jessica Venebles) is such a fascinating artist that a pause for reinvention and rumour of a new album makes you wonder not only where she’ll go next but confident she’ll arrest attention when she does. As it turns out this most compelling of vocalists has moved from the intimate fragility of her work so far and confidently into the world of icy electropop. Now fronting a four-piece made up of singer Emma Russock, brother violinist Nick and synth/laptop operator Aaron Lam, the set is laden with glistening, reverb-soaked paeans to psychological obsession, twisted love and generally being extremely assertive. It’s a stunning set, and songs like Xanax Baby, Queen of the Night and the closing Rock Candy suggest a stellar album in the offing.

Fresh from blowing minds with their video for recent single Adriana, Montero open their set with Clear Sailing/Alpha World City #2, silencing and flummoxing early-comers. A Montero gig is very much dependant on the mood of frontman and songwriter Bjenny Montero and tonight sees him in ‘slightly unhinged’ mode, which means bug eyed stares, strange interactions with an optical fibre lamp and some coruscating vocalising. The synth-pop bounce of Mumbai follows before a bizarrely faithful version of Max Merrit and the Meteors’ Slippin’ Away From Me. These soul-pop musical roots ground the final two songs Ya Gotta Be Alone and You’re Gonna Make a Monkey Out of Me, both of which follow the Montero default move; a tender piano intro, a killer drum fill and some scorching 70s psych pop.

Though the Little Red elephant in the room is never mentioned, it exerts its influence in strange ways. New Gods consist of singer/guitarist Dominic Byrne and guitarist Adrian Beltrame of Little Red, synth player Dale Packard of Ground Components and bassist Richard Bradbeer of Eagle and the Worm, so the band are, unsurprisingly, incredibly well rehearsed. Their songs are big on hooks and tight on harmonies, and the opening few almost perfunctory in their delivery. Byrne is actually apologetic for the few moments that stray from this script; a ‘folk dirge that isn’t depressing’ Wonders of the World is hastily pushed into the past once finished, the brief and mellow 10000 Miles with its harmonica is laughed off as soon as its over, and a saxophone-lead free jazz moment is dismissed as ‘just us fucking around’, but it’s these deviations that are the most interesting moments. Byrne seems far smarter than he is able to express in this context, as the Bill Hicks-dedicated Eyes of Love hints. It’s not until the final few songs (Skipping Stone, Day Off Work and the ‘medley of our hit’ On Your Side) that the guitars cut loose and the clean, choppy, mid-paced fare is left behind and we can see what the band as a true combination of the talent therein. Fronting two bands beloved of our national youth broadcaster is admirable, but I’m betting Byrne’s best is to come.

Live Review: HOT CHIP, WORLD’S END PRESS

Palace Theatre

A smattering of applause greets World’s End Press as they step out to stretch along the front of the stage, packed with a phenomenal amount of equipment. If there is one band in this city playing the long game it’s these guys, and it shows. Singer John Parkinson’s voice is stronger and more expressive than it’s ever been, and his hyperkinetic performance makes them electrifying to watch as well as move to. Newer songs take their Moroder-like chug, add arresting vocal harmonies, some monolithic bass and send it into the stratosphere; every song sounds like a 12” remix of a hit. Echoes of Japan, Human League and Talking Heads may be touchstones but the band are such meticulous musicians and arrangers that their sound is all their own. Final song Someone’s Daddy is the strongest example yet that they’re ready to break out in a huge way, and it’s no surprise they leave to peals of rapturous cheers.

By now all four levels of the Palace are full and the crowd, broad in age range and dress style, are clearly amped. Suddenly, the stage lights die, strobes blast, bursts of percussion erupt and Hot Chip emerge, waving and launching into Shake A Fist. For a bunch of demure British men who would look more at home around a kitchen table playing Dungeons and Dragons than making a crowd of thousands react as if One Direction gatecrashed a slumber party, they know how to bring it. Following up with Boy From School and new single Don’t Deny the Heart, the crowd soon becomes a writhing, flailing mess. Now featuring New Young Pony Club drummer Sarah Jones, there is a fluid accuracy to the band’s playing and the humanity inherent in singer Alex Taylor’s lyrics stops even a hint of mechanisation to what is partially programmed music. Writer of some of the greatest songs about loving fellow men (whether physically or in a more genial ‘matey’ way is enticingly vague), Taylor is a brilliant example of how an intelligent, literate writer and composer can make intelligent and literate pop seem innately appealing to people who hate the term literate being applied to music.

Tonight is their last show of a ten-month tour, so unsurprisingly the set is tighter than Jones’ snare drum. Now five albums into their career, with a ream of modern dance classics to draw from, the newer work segues smoothly into the floor fillers. Flutes, Over and Over, Ready For the Floor (which leads into a cover of Fleetwood Mac’s Everywhere) and the gentle mid-set drift of Look At Where We Are (and it’s hint of Prince’s If I Was Your Girlfriend) are sequenced perfectly.  

Howled back on for a bashful encore, Al Doyle (not only playing five instruments in Hot Chip, but also a recent multi-instrumentalist for LCD Soundsystem) explains how loved we are before airing the rarely-heard Crap Kraft Dinner, a sterling I Feel Better and the anthemic album highlight Let Me Be Him; a thumping finish to a stunning gig. There are few bands attracting so large a crowd with this sort of music, and that they do it entirely on the quality of the songs and an absence of concession to trends makes their success all the more admirable.

CD Review: THE TIGER & ME - The Drifter’s Dawn

 Four | Four

In the endless striving for an open, honest, unaffected and authentic sound, there is a chance to be left by the wayside as dozens of combos ply the folk-rock route so beloved of Australia - a no bullshit approach to getting the creative urge out in a time-honoured tradition. The Tiger & Me, who have impressed a lot of people already, got themselves signed to ABC Music’s indie arm Four|Four before releasing this, their second album, are in no danger of getting lost. Not only do they have genuine live passion, a versatility that sees them suit a rowdy wake or a solemn funeral, but qualities many of these other bands lack; focus, and a work ethic.

Recorded live by Steve Schram, this natural approach is fitting for the sometimes drifting sometimes driving acoustic guitars, propulsive rhythms and deft mingling of the voices of singers Ade Vincent, Jane Hendry and Tobias Selkirk. With a welcome disregard for genre, the sextet play whatever works live, and as so may other bands do, they end up recording what gets a response, It’s when they venture away from that default situation that things get interesting. Songwriting chops are revealed on the gentle, growing lilt of The Door Swung, and ethereal beauty of A Want That You Wouldn’t, both redolent with subtleties that would get overlooked by a crowd ready for the upbeat singalongs. These, like opener Dance With The Devil, Waltz #3 and The Prophet Told Me are where things get a little more Baltic/Gypsy/Open Studio and audience responses tend to get divided. The bouncing pop of single Pantomime bears little resemblance to anything else on the album, but that’s more a demonstration of the breadth of their writing than any misleading gesture.  

With an East Coast full of dudes strumming acoustic guitars and getting free and international with rhythms, it’s refreshing to find an Australian group who know when to rein in the jams, work as a multitalented collective and know how to sift through a sprawling range of styles to come up with a coherent and punchy album. 

2012: THE YEAR IN LISTS

If there is a unifying theme among the music, words and films of 2012, it is one of style over substance. It seems, with a few notable exceptions, that we expect things to reference what has gone before, and we love it when they do. Even at the expense of surprise or (in the case of most popular movies this year) logic, the most important thing is to hit the right reference at the right time and in the right context. 

Perhaps its a combination of the most popular music and films being marketed in more imaginative ways, but we seem to forgive more easily, and expect our artists to be part of an industry rather than existing in their own place and time. The concept of 'selling out' seems almost antiquated now as more and more art jostles for our attention.

Everyone seemed to love Looper and most people enjoyed The Dark Knight Rises and Skyfall despite none of these films making sense. They were fun, the heroes were in interesting situations, solving engaging problems, the cinematography, pacing and supporting cast were excellent. Tame Impala ruled all that came before them, trailing souped-up psych rock riffs and John Lennon's voice circa November 1966 with every song, but none of this stopped anyone from loving the pants off their album. It seems likely that the next few years of Triple J programming will feature high-schoolers playing poorly-produced rip offs of Lonerism, and why not? Still, there is an interesting question to ask around what makes us admit and overlook shortcomings like these examples, while lambasting others.

This penchant throws the work of 2012's truly imaginative artists into even greater relief. To enjoy Swans' The Seer or Scott Walker's Bish Bosch, or even the staggeringly bizarre French film Holy Motors you have to be willing to surrender a traditional sense of logic and relationships and feel overwhelmed for a while at least. And these are dark, and strange and glorious worlds. It's a rare individual who can get their head around Scott Walker's work. To really understand Bish Bosch requires an unfeasibly broad range of knowledge of European cultural history, zoology, Polish and astronomy, and that's just for one song. Of course you can really get a huge amount out of his work without knowing anything, but the simple fact that an artist puts that much knowledge into a song and expects you to bring something to the table when listening is exciting, and refreshing. In this year of shameless recycling and referencing, it's interesting that the most challenging and original stuff comes from elderly men who long ago gave up caring what anyone else thought of them. 

Given that these creations are exciting in their blending of imagination and sound, they're still not places I want to spend a lot of time, whereas the dulcet tones of 'Allo Darlin, the haunting beauty and ingenuity of James Blackshaw's composing, Ryan Sterlings fluid guitar work and the evocative space of Burial's beats evoke a freedom and seem less instructive. They allow you to breathe and respond. 2012's most celebrated musician Frank Ocean lets you do this too, leaving a lot of space and intrigue with low-fi interludes, warm, sweet voice and vast range of sounds and instruments. Maybe not everyone, but a surprising number of people, responded to it, as they did to another unpredictable flight of imagination with a solid grounding in an outsiders view of social and personal challenges, the film Beasts of the Southern Wild. Which made for a welcome change.

2013 is the year of the Customer, according to The Guardian. I'm hoping that the opposite is true, that 'My' this and 'I' that can be replaced by just a smidgen of social conscience and caring for others, since it seems to be there in a lot of the music and film we loved in 2012.

TOP TEN ALBUMS

1. Europe ‘ALLO DARLIN

2. Bish Bosch SCOTT WALKER

3. Love Is The Plan, The Plan Is Death JAMES BLACKSHAW

4. Lonerism TAME IMPALA

5. Channel Orange FRANK OCEAN

6. I Know What Love Isn’t JENS LEKMAN

7. Sweet Heart, Sweet Light SPIRITUALIZED

8. Double Natural BOOMGATES

9. ‘Allelujah! Don’t Bend Ascend! GODSPEED YOU! BLACK EMPEROR

10. Palace Laundry RYAN STERLING

TOP FIVE REISSUE/REMIX ALBUMS

1. Pasted Youth CLAG

2. Dreamin' Wild DONNIE AND JOE EMERSON 

3. Trilogy THE WEEKND

4. Acid Reflux THE PAINS OF BEING PURE AT HEART

5. Bastards (Biophilia Remix Album) BJORK

TOP TWENTY SONGS


1. Kindred BURIAL

2. D Minus STEP-PANTHER

3. The Kids Were Wrong MEMORYHOUSE

4. Europe ‘ALLO DARLIN

5. Naked TULLY ON TULLY

6.  I’m The Worst CATSUIT

7. Stay Useless CLOUD NOTHINGS

8. He’s In Stock TWERPS

9. Locked FOUR TET 

10. Hold On ALABAMA SHAKES

11. The End of The World Is Bigger Than Love JENS LEKMAN

12. Fineshrine PURITY RING

13. Inspector Norse TODD TERJE

14. Feels Like We Only Go Backwards TAME IMPALA

15. Whispering & Singing BOOMGATES

16. Widower ELLEN KIBBLE

17. I Belong In Your Arms CHAIRLIFT

18. Kill For Love CHROMATICS

19. Ecce Homo TITUS ANDRONICUS

20. Andrew in Drag THE MAGNETIC FIELDS

BEST NEW ARTISTS

1. ‘Allo Darlin

2. Boomgates

3. The Spinning Rooms

4. Ellen Kibble

5. Kinch Kinski

TOP FIVE INTERNATIONAL ARTIST GIGS

1. Prince ROD LAVER ARENA

2. Taylor Swift ROD LAVER ARENA

3. Los Campesinos! HARVEST FESTIVAL

4. Aphex Twin PALACE THEATRE

5. Primal Scream PALACE THEATRE

TOP FIVE AUSTRALIAN ARTIST GIGS

1. Lost Animal GOLDEN PLAINS

2. Kinch Kinski THE OLD BAR

3. Clag NORTH MELBOURNE TOWN HALL

4. Lowtide GASOMETER

5. Twerps NORTH MELBOURNE TOWN HALL

TOP FIVE RADIO SHOWS/PODCASTS

1. Mark Kermode and Simon Mayo’s Film Reviews BBC FIVE LIVE


2. Filmspotting CHICAGO PUBLIC RADIO

3. In Our Time With Melvyn Bragg BBC RADIO 4

4. Lime Champions RRR


5. Go Deep With Bruce Rave MOHEAK RADIO

TOP TEN TV SHOWS

1. Sherlock BBC1

2. Game of Thrones HBO

3. Mad Men AMC

4. Media Watch ABC

5. The Amazing World of Gumball CARTOON NETWORK

6. The Newsroom HBO

7. Suits USA NETWORK

8. A Touch of Cloth SKY1

9. Problems ABC

10. Bunheads ABC FAMILY

TOP TWENTY MOVIES (RELEASED IN AUSTRALIA IN 2012)

1. The Perks of Being A Wallflower

2. Beasts of the Southern Wild

3. Tinker Tailor Solider Spy

4. Shame

5. A Royal Affair

6. Holy Motors

7. Once Upon a Time in Anatolia

8. Killing Them Softly

9. Skyfall

10. Damsels in Distress

11. The Artist

12. Seven Psychopaths

13. Monsieur Lazhar

14. Moonrise Kingdom

15. Looper

16. The Master

17. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

18. The Dark Knight Rises

19. Frankenweenie 

20. Argo

Live Review: PRIMAL SCREAM, THE SAND PEBBLES

The Palace Theatre

True to form much of the crowd in the Palace is dressed in black, part of a couple and over 30. This is the audience willing to pay $90 a ticket to let their arms and mouths do the appreciating, and while at some shows it can mean a lack of energy, tonight it’s no bad thing.

Six-piece, psych combo The Sand Pebbles do chugging rock better than most and the slowly gathering crowd clearly like what they’ve got. Their three guitars are put to use cranking out sprawling metronomic propulsions replete with vocal harmonies, tight drumming and crunchy bass. Occasionally busting out furious psych rock on songs like Wild Season, that they don’t lose the textures and space that make slower tracks like The Weight of the World so great is testament to the careful thought they put into these songs, something lacking from a lot of musicians who dabble in psych rock.

Before a row of Marshall amps, a drum skin sporting the Screamadelica cover and a selection of large, blinding white lights comes Bobby. Sure, there is a fantastic backing band who resemble the last five people found at 9AM at Pony (and feature longtime members Andrew Innes, Martin Duffy and Mani-replacement Simone Butler on bass), but it’s the rake thin Bobby Gillespie we’re here to see. And for one man beating a black tambourine, wearing a cowboy shirt and what looks like XS-waist black jeans, he gives us a lot to look at. Smiling widely Gillespie leads us through 2012, past a deafeningly adoring crowd response to the intro of Swastika Eyes and into the euphoria of Movin’ On Up. It’s a perfectly chosen setlist. The muscle put into the older, more danceable songs pull them up to date and lets them sit comfortably beside the more intense material off Vanishing Point and Xterminator. The sly lope of Slip Inside This House eases into the (literally) blinding seizure-suggesting lightshow accompanying the intense Accelerator, a Rowland S. Howard-dedicated Damaged and first of two new songs Relativity. ‘This next one is much more accessible’ mumbles Gillespie in a rare moment of intelligible banter before introducing the most radio-friendly song he’s written in decades It’s Alright, It’s OK.

Seemingly immune from the aging process, or vagaries of fashion trends Gillespie never stops moving, both musically and literally. It’s hard to take your eyes off him. As at home fronting a psych-house group, that the group sometimes assume, their transformation into a white hot southern rock combo for the encore still leaves them unable to sound like anyone else. Set highlight Shoot Speed passes like an out-of-control freight train and jars beautifully when up against the gospel sing-along of Come Together and set-closer Country Girl.

Returning to the stage for I’m Losing More Than I’ll Ever Have/Loaded it’s like they can’t lose. Guitarist Barrie Cadogan (he of Little Barrie fame) seems like a smaller version of Gillespie, and the two frequently engage in some shoulder bumping and back-slapping in a way that is reminiscent of The Faces or Mick and Keef’s dynamic. Finishing with their most rock-ready hits, Jailbird and Rocks, the crowd shout themselves hoarse as the music ends and the stage is overtaken by a howling wall of feedback, looped percussion and those blinding lights. Bobby standing mid-stage batting the air, entranced by the sound, ending one of the gigs of the year in a state of sonic overload.

Live Review: JOHN REILLY AND FRIENDS, STEVE SMYTH

Northcote Social Club

It’s a thoroughly packed Northcote Social Club tonight, full of curious camera-phone wielding John C Reilly fans (Disney forbids the use of the ‘C’ for promotional purposes, so Reilly says by way of introduction), and genuine bluegrass aficionados. Keeping an audience silent throughout his arresting set is Steve Smyth, a performer with confidence and conviction matched only by the size of his voluminous beard. Often singing off-mic (most notably for the chain-gang stomp of Sylvie), and occasionally strumming a cheap acoustic guitar, Smyth lurches from quiet croon to Waitesian bellow as the mood takes him, and it takes him all over the NSC stage and into physical contortions that would be rendered ridiculous were it not for his power. If a concept of musical ‘integrity’ can be found by stripping a song away to its barest form, then Smyth is about as naked as a performer can be. Though the final song Cocaine Mountain features the lyrics ‘I’ve touched the face of witches / Held the hand of the devil’s apprentice’, which rings hollow for a 20-something guy from Sydney with the voice of an aging African American, he is a striking performer and wins many new fans.

Before the applause dies, and with Smyth only off the stage for seconds, John Reilly and his ‘Friends’ singer Becky Stark and guitarist and singer Tom Brousseau stride onstage, and burst into Good Morning Captain. ‘Feel like yodeling?’ Reilly asks with a wry smile. We don’t it seems, because this is the inner north of Melbourne and most of us are here to see a famous actor in the flesh, but that doesn’t stop him from letting loose. Dressed in a white shirt, waistcoat, fedora and sporting a temperamental old Gibson guitar named Charlie, Reilly is so incredibly at ease that it’s impossible to dislike him, and thereby the music he’s here to play, which is simple, beautiful and powerful. Interspersing stories, jokes and politely dismissing requests to songs from his films (Boats N Hoes etc.) Reilly focuses on the songs he’s here to get through, though a surprising amount of hilarity comes from Stark and Brousseau, all of who have fantastic floating voices. The songs themselves begin as bluegrass classics and move into a more country style (Stanley Brothers’ Start Over New, The Carter Family’s A Winding Stream and Claude Ely’s Ain't No Grave), the trio’s keening harmonies silencing the room.

After a hilarious story about filming The Thin Red Line in Queensland (complete with a wayward Aussie accent) Reilly quips 'we'll give you a laugh now then play a song that's absolutely devastating,' before heading into Johnny Cash’s harrowing Dark As a Dungeon and a jauntier Maybe Tomorrow by The Everley Brothers. ‘Hey, I’m not Slash up here’ he deadpans when going for a guitar solo. With a rumour of a cameo from Sarah Silverman, also in town to promote Wreck It Ralph, we instead get special guest Lanie Lane. Her and Reilly tackle Lee Hazelwood’s Jackson that Lane promptly forgets the words to, though Reilly’s charismatic plea that ‘you can get a polished act any day of the week' softens the mess it becomes. An encore of a very Elvis-y Blue Christmas, then a lullaby in the pitch-darkness, is a treat. Finally a sing-along of Goodnight Irene seals the whole show as one in which the performers are there for the love of the music and its performance alone, without having anything to prove or sell.