The Met - Thu Jun 12

The Met is deserted when doors open. The Whiskey Tears DJs spin go-go stop beats, heavy on vocal hooks and italo keyboard flourishes. The venue is something ripped straight out of the nineties New York meat packing district: all black, fish bowls, metal cages and fronted by a bank of video screens. Intermittently smoke bellows onto the empty dance floor. It’s depressing. This reviewer takes a disco nap.

Three hours later and still no progress. A sizeable crowd dances to Robert Palmer. I put on my investigator hat as a staff member speculates that they are pushing the night out to recover the cost of selling only 220 tickets to a 1500 capacity venue. Sydney’s Flying Foxes start at 11:20pm with jangly guitars and slacker vocals that sound a little like a rough edged Phoenix. Their skilled bass player gets the crowd bobbing their heads by the end of the short set.

Nearly an hour later French electro dreamboats The Teenagers still haven’t started. Backstage one of them is hitting on my ex-girlfriend and I start drinking their generous rider out of spite. It will become an issue later, but not for me. Well into the next day lead singer Quentin Delafon announces that he is from planet earth and that we all look pale and anorexic. The five touring members begin and a relieved crowd sings along to Feeling Better. Far more rock & roll live, III comes off as a French version of The Vines. Single Homecoming elicits a cheer and girls are invited onstage to sing I loved my English romance in response to I fucked my American cunt.  Of course, it all falls apart. The drum kit breaks. The Teenagers tell us they’re afraid. Now it’s impromptu open mic night and punters shout indiscernible obscenities. Security intervenes. A hasty last song is sung. Issues of misogyny remain unresolved, but there was no doubt it was fun.

ANTHONY WALSH

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