Photo: Aaron Sammut

I feel I must warn you that my mood is not of the highest quality tonight. It’s effing cold, there are about twelve hours sleep I’m missing out on and I take three steps into the studios before dropping my first beer, routinely exploding all over my shoes. Top work Mitchell. I’ll do my best to ensure this doesn’t influence the review, but I’m not making any promises.

It’s pushing around 9:15 when young locals The Cairos make their appearance after many occasions of single members walking on, twiddling with a few knobs and walking off again. They introduce their set with what is apparently a new song that I’ll dub ‘Snare Drum & Fuzz Guitar’. If you close your eyes it sounds good, but open them again and you’re staring at four 17 year-olds, putting bands with twice their experience to shame in terms of energy and presence. However, what began as a promising set grows increasingly tedious in a crowd comprised predominantly of school friends and scenesters who’ve been taking all their cues from the style section of Rolling Stone. Which means lots of $80 flannel shirts and heroin chic hair, yawn. After a while, it becomes painfully evident that these kids only have two settings: snare & hi-hat dance rock and slow, moody drones.

I wasn’t expecting much variation when The Holidays come on, all the signposts seem to present themselves quickly. Weedy singer with not much in the way of audience connection? Check. Lead guitarist with pained expression that takes himself too seriously while playing three notes? Check. Where’s that damned pool table when you need it? Despite their indie rock cliché crimes, this Sydney quartet actually put on a decent show when you manage to wade through the crud sound. It’s not much more than your typical angular dance rock, with equal debts owed to ‘80s post punk and the ‘new rock’ from the early years of this millennium, but the crowd response is more receptive than the first set, a few punters even venturing closer to the stage for a better look.

After what seems like an eternity (it’s probably 20 minutes tops, but time stands still when you’re mourning the loss of an unopened beer), the Adelaide-born gents known as Wolf & Cub waste little time in creating a cacophonous wall of noise in the form of distorted guitar feedback and drums. The polyrhythmic effect of two drummers locking in with the bassist makes for some grooves you could almost get lost in, inspiring the fairly empathetic crowd to bob their head along. Upcoming single One To The Other gets a positive response from the crowd, as the band tread further down the road of 1970s riff rock. Plus, I could never really say bad things about a band who pass a goon sack around between songs. Unless it was Roxy Music … it would just spoil the allure, y’know? Although it seems like 60% of the crowd have been dragged along tonight by the other 40% to see what the moderate fuss is about, the band’s filthy punk and chunky atmospherics make for a pretty appealing show. I guess derivative is the new black.

MITCH ALEXANDER

Comments (1)

Rosie’s - Fri Jun 27

Only but a year ago Rosie’s, or as it was then known Club Phoenix, was THE place to be if metal was your thing. However, as the saying goes all good things must come to an end and now the local metal scene has lost its former home. Tonight’s show serves as a reminder of the talented that once frequented Phoenix.

Openers Humality really serve as a showcase for drummer Matthew Lynn’s talents. Building on his foundation of Gatling gun blast beats, the rest of the band lay down a series of heavy, hook-laden riffs that indicate to the future successes of the band.

Next up Silence Is Surrender take the stage at Phoenix, oops Rosie’s. In surprising contrast to the majority of local metal bands, Silence Is Surrender incorporate solos in a fair few of their songs in tonight’s set. Well executed and technical, these guitar parts hold the audience’s interest in the set.

Is it just me or does anyone else confuse Violent Green with Soilent Green? The similarities between the two bands even extend beyond the name. Like the New Orleans institution, tonight sees local lads Violent Green meld genres like nobody’s business.

People Die are known to put on a killer show and tonight the audience gets exactly what’s expected. Blending grindcore intensity with death metal riffs, the four piece has the crowd warmed up for the headliners.

Hailing from New Zealand, Sinate’s thrash-influenced death metal attracts the gathering crowd to the area surrounding the stage. Tonight the band is tight and cannot seem to do anything wrong. Sinate’s Morbid Angel-influenced tunes are over too soon and punters wander out into the frigid June cold, warmed by a kick arse metal show all too reminiscent of the types of shows we used to be treated to on an almost weekly basis.  

TOM HERSEY

Comments (1)

Photo: Helen Alwan

It’s all starting up a bit late at The Zoo tonight, but Melbourne’s Reptiles are ready, instruments in hand. Though their brand of punk rock sounds fresh from the garage, they have some interesting sections where they start running around like a half-cut grunge band – quite rough and occasionally exciting.

The formidable Paper And The Plane are a completely different outfit; their swirling rhythms and dynamic vocals easily envelops the audience for the duration of the set – highlighted by the quintet dropping into a searing version of At The Drive In’s Invalid Letter Dept. Anyone still in doubt that the band are one of the brighter stars in the Brisbane scene simply hasn’t seen them yet.

Something With Numbers clearly have the numbers (pun intended) on their side tonight; everybody in The Zoo is clapping and chanting along to popular songs such as Calf Love and Apple Of The Eye (Lay Me Down) from the band’s Perfect Distraction album. Even without being a fan, I found it hard not to enjoy such an energetic performance; you can tell Something With Numbers are just one of those bands that still love the game, rather than being made to play it.

SCOTT HARMS

Be first to comment on this article

Waterloo Hotel - Sat Jun 28

The second annual Brutalfest sees one of the best line-ups assembled playing in a venue not exactly ideal for metal. Held in a beer garden-type place, the acoustics lack the visceral low-end rumbles so important to extreme metal. However, fans of the genre who are not deterred by the venue and the trek required to get to it find themselves greatly rewarded.

Before the sun has left the sky The Decimation Protocol have ripped through a quick set of brutal death metal that benefits greatly from a sharing of vocal duties.

Also primarily taking cues from death metal influences, five-piece Defamer spice things up with black metal guitar tones and a well placed use of tremolo picking. Well-known on the local scene, Defamer’s set goes down a treat with the slowly growing crowd.

The first interstate band to grace the Brutalfest II stage, Wollongong’s Daemon Foetal Harvest, appear at home on the stage peddling their brand of death metal 2.0. Blistering riffs in songs like Abducted & Compacted and Dumped In The Mangroves make this set stand out against the other bands on the bill.

Melbourne’s Die Pigeon Die set is slightly disappointing. The pitch-shifted vomit vocals don’t come off live as they do on recordings of the four-piece. And really, what’s gore grind without those crazy warbles?

The darkest thing to come from the Sunshine Coast, six-piece Excruciate, pedal their sordid tales of women and morgues with their reliable maniac intensity. Vocalists Nads and Tom trade off pig squeals through a set predominantly featuring tracks off their debut Bound & Gagged album.

Keeping the grindcore momentum going, the half hour on stage by Sydney’s Ebolie seems too quick. With songs stripped of their comedic value sans voice samples, Ebolie’s musicianship stands triumphantly on its own.

Limb From Limb take to the stage slogging through a furious death metal set that is heightened by the experienced five piece’s commanding stage presence. Playing heavily off last year’s Rip Him From His Fucking Throne, Limb From Limb’s sound is layered and punishing as ever tonight.

M.S.I. journeyed from Tasmania to Brutalfest II, and when they take the stage at 9:15pm the crowd (some of whom had been drinking steadily since the late afternoon) show their appreciation. M.S.I. blend extreme influences into fluid set that highlights the musicianship of the band.

Sinate’s follow up to their Friday show at Rosie’s shows the consistency of the New Zealand four-piece, once again putting on an amazing display of their thrash-driven death metal.

Fresh from an American tour, Melbourne five piece Fuck I’m Dead proceed to systematically tear the stage a new arsehole. Dressed like a gang of blood-thirsty Mormons, Fuck I’m Dead’s thundering grindcore whips the now sizable crowd into a frenzy and the 40 minutes of stage time they get doesn’t feel like enough.

After all the fun is over, the crowd exits, waiting for next year’s Brutalfest while trying to figure out how the hell to get back to civilisation.

TOM HERSEY

Be first to comment on this article

QPAC Playhouse - Sun Jun 29

Named after the feeding tube that directs nutrients to an unborn baby, so do Sydney’s The Umbilical Brothers provide Brisbane’s avid fans of mime magnificence with an enthralling dose of non-stop hilarity. While relatively quiet for the last year and a half or so, Dave Collins and Shane Dundas have proved that anything is possible with a microphone and a stage. Impressing the vastly age varied audience with simple slapstick gags layered with complex sound effects, they ease the crowd into a night of failsafe formulaic shenanigans. For those who witnessed 2004’s Speedmouse, this reviewer can’t help but feel as though the brothers are willing participants in a good old fashioned rehash for cash expedition. The onstage banter blurs any expected scheduled direction, but with great aplomb. I feel the only real constant throughout is the no-doubt scripted and routine rivalry that prevails between both performers, many highlights extracted therein. Heckling is encouraged and many memorable moments are born as a result of the quick-witted brothers responses when vocal crowd members express their opinions. The Umbilical Brothers have been performing their satirical shtick for nearly 20 years now and it’s clear that as long as Australians still like to indulge in watching two grown men run around a stage creating limitless sounds and situations, then you may be seeing them in 20 more.

CAEL FENBY

Be first to comment on this article