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Spin Off Festival - Adelaide Showgrounds 

7/23/2012

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A festival in winter? In Adelaide? Are you serious? Yep, the inaugural Spin Off Festival has been and gone giving punters a taste of Splendour In The Grass making for an all round positive experience. Hats off to promoters for taking a punt on Adelaide when so many don’t! Hopefully they keep persisting with this festival making it an uniquely Adelaide experience bringing even bigger acts to town. It’s a shame that the rumoured additions to the line up including the likes of Bloc Party and At The Drive in did not come to fruition.

Having all the bands literally under one roof made it easy and took the pain out of deciding which to see or not to see. Whilst the attendance figure wasn’t disastrous there was still plenty of room to squeeze in a few more who might have changed their mind on the day but opted to watch The Crows instead.

Like any festival it is a full day commitment if you want your money’s worth with the pick of the bunch early being The DZ Deathrays and The Rubens. Good to note that The Bleeding Knees Club didn’t run quite a muck as previous visits to A-Town. UK band Friends were ok and didn’t quite reach the lofty heights of their highly touted debut album Manifest. Good to see but the big question is whether they’ll see album number two.

The Last Dinosaurs played a lively and energetic set. Personally, I was never was a big fan of their debut album In A Million Years but after seeing them on the big stage I’ve changed my tune on them slightly. Returning to Adelaide for the first time since touring Europe they look psyched to be playing in front of an Aussie crowd. Honolulu, Andy and Zoom were obvious crowd pleasers.

The Band Of Skulls were freaking brilliant! They owned the stage winning hearts and minds with punters like myself wanting to buy both albums and source any other releases they might have. In a haze of orange lights the bruising opening of Sweet Sour heralded the beginning of a memorable set. The intensity of drummer Matt Hayward’s should be duly noted breaking a stick early in the piece. Their stage presence was definitely the lack of stage presence letting the music do all the talking. They had the look and did seem “to cool for school” but hey when you’re this good. Lies, Patterns, Fires and Bruises were nothing short of sensational.

It was right about now lead singer Russell Marsden said to punters “let’s have some fun” pulling Hollywood Bowl out of the kit bag. Marsden also asked punters to help out with I Know What I Am but it was the bitchin’ rendition of The Devil Takes Care Of His Own that stood out as the highlight in their set. Death By Diamonds And Pearls bought their set to an end and we can only hope they grace our shores again sometime soon.

Lana Del Rey! Wow! If there was ever a performance that would silence the critics it was this one. She won the hearts and minds of punters ten times over as they were full of admiration of adulation of this pop princess. There were no real surprises with her stock standard nine song festival set but that’s all that was needed to push punters over the edge. Even before she came out on stage they were chanting her name which turned to screams when she entered stage right. No doubt Del Rey should have headlined.

After the technical problems were sorted Del Rey walked out waving to the crowd and looked a little surprised by such a reception. Opening with Blue Jeans she had the audience in the palm of her hand even treating them to a new song Body Electric. Born To Die brought the house down and wanting to say hi to her fans she jumped down to hug, kiss and pose for photos with the lucky few who’s waiting down on the front fence paid off big time. Going a bit jazzy with Million Dollar Man proved a highlight as did Video Games. Del Rey echoed the sentiment that she “had fun, it has been good and I hope you feel good” leaving a lasting impression with National Anthem.

Interesting to note how many people left after Lana Del Rey’s set ahead of Kimbra. Kimbra for me anyway is an acquired taste and probably not a festival headliner at this point in time. Having said that though she did bring plenty of colour, excitement and energy to the stage. After a massive year touring overseas and jumping on board the Gotye gravy train she proved that she isn’t no one trick pony. Limbo and Good Intent got her set off to a flying start continuing that energy on in Love Is A Two Way Street and Marigold.

The Nina Simone cover Plain Gold Ring was a good one and familiar faces Samaritan, Call Me and Old Flame were well received. The recent collaboration with Mark Foster and A-Trak Warrior went down well and when Kimbra announced that Come Into My Head would be her last song it was comical watching just about everyone making a mad dash for the car park to get a ahead of the traffic.

Thumbs up Spin Off! Fingers crossed for a return next year.



Review: Rob Lyon
Photo: Supernova Photographics. Check out all the pics here




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Terror (with Search and Destroy, The Weight and Iron Mind) @ Fowlers Live 13/07/12

7/16/2012

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Terror; not a rock and roll band. If you’d showed up at Fowlers last Friday night expecting a rock and roll show, you’d have been disappointed. About the only thing rock and rolling during the night were the sea of heads at the rail, and bodies on the floor (about 300 to be exact, and not a still body as far as the eye could see). They were slick with sweat, tearing up the ground like it was a battlefield and the bands their lieutenants, directing a straight up hardcore orchestra of war like drum beats and punchy guitar rhythms that raised devil horns, fists and arms in the air in unison.

Leading the charge were Adelaide hardcore band, Search and Destroy. With the release of their debut 7 inch, Eye of Terror, Search and Destroy have gone from strength to strength in the local scene, bringing the support of local punters and Suppression Records to the table and throwing it all down with some rough riffs and guttural growls from the band (and a few lucky fans at the rail!) from the very first song. If the success of their debut EP was judged on punters, I’d say the Eye of Terror is tracking you’ll want to keep your eye on –available to fans for just a few months so far (and in their online store via http://searchanddestroy.bigcartel.com/), songs were already sung, roared and jumped along to throughout the set. The intensity of the music and the local boys who made it has proved that Search and Destroy will be a force to be reckoned with for years to come.

Added weight to the show, The Weight, another band hailing from the City of Churches flew on stage and into the second slot for the night, opening with brutal tuning that channelled old school Slayer, with some hardcore riffs and a guttural scream thrown in for good measure. The Weight are the real deal and they’re not afraid to show it. Entering the scene in 2008, they’ve been playing shows and releasing music online and in demos for a straight four years, picking up a guitarist along the way to solidify their unit. Their debut album is due for release next month, and with a few previews of songs, as well as few fan favourites off the demo, they kept the crowd screaming for more.

For anyone who thinks the role of the bassist is gone and forgotten in music of today, they haven’t experienced a live hardcore show like that of Friday night. On the stage, the energy from the bassists was almost equal to the singers and if there was something to prove, the bassists of Search and Destroy and The Weight gave it their all. Rounding up near the end of their set, the bassist of The Weight added to the drumline, pounding knuckles against the body of his guitar to the beat as feet and fists rose in the air, bringing them closer to the punters and carrying forward the energy of the night.

Dubbed by many as the next big thing in Australian hardcore, Iron Mind took to the stage next and gave Adelaide a serve of the raw, rhythmic display of power (and flesh if you were lead singer, Sam Octigan in a ballsy move that set a number of caps and shirts flying off in the mosh), showing why Melbourne hardcore is well respected in the scene. Hammering out songs off their LP, Hell Split Wide Open (available at http://ironmind.bigcartel.com/product/hell-split-wide-open-gatefold-12-lp), Iron Mind mirrored their fans, tearing up the stage and not missing a beat in an impressive and remarkably familiar spectacle of showmanship that begged the question of whether their instruments were in fact instruments and not simply extra body parts that were permanently attached to their owners (looking at the artwork of Hell Split Wide Open, it seems like Octigan was born with a mic in one hand and a paint brush in the other – more of his work is available for public viewing at http://www.samoctigan.com/). With a cry of ‘move up, move in, move out’, Octigan kept the energy of the show at an all time high before making way for the hardcore legends and Keepers of the Faith that everyone was waiting for – Terror.

 With just under half a dozen tours in Australia up their tattooed sleeves already and a decade of touring and releasing music worldwide since their formation in 2002, Terror commands attention before ex Buried Alive and Despair frontman, Scott Vogel even opens his mouth with the call of “everybody better fucking move”. There’s not an “or else” that follows, but it’s not hard to imagine. Vogel’s reputation of psyching up and urging on his loyal fans precedes him with a website now solely dedicated to his figures of speech (view it at http://vogelisms.com/); every instruction he spits is followed, every supportive, rousing speech is met with steadfast fists and the pounding of feet and cheering – a metalcore army in the making. Everybody moves; somehow the stage takes the load of a couple hundred pounds of all-American muscle while the rail, put up for the protection of the lightweight and female punters because hardcore doesn’t discriminate, takes a vicious beating from energetic fan and vigilante security alike. After all, in Vogel’s own words, the rail is just a mental barricade – only we, the fans can get rid of it. We try. The crowd interaction is just what the doctor ordered. Feeding off the electricity of everybody’s blood, sweat and tears, Terror launched into the highlights of their albums, electing fan favourites like Stick Tight, Keepers of the Faith, You’re Caught, Never Alone and One With the Underdogs. There is no time for more. Vogel admits they could try and fit in all their discography into the set – all 74 songs, and he’s met with roars of approval, but this is a fast paced hardcore show that takes no prisoners but for a few hours that leave you aching for the next tour. But they’ll be back, that much Terror can promise; they may be thought of as rock and roll legends, but they care – they give a fuck and if you believe in Terror and the music they create, they’re in it for you, 110 percent.

The hardcore genre and bands that carry it forward offer no alternative – they are what they are, no bullshit, no pretence, no toeing the line of what’s conventional or allowed. And if you take it for what it is – a barrage of strength, loyalty and fury in both music and musician, then it will embrace you with open arms as big and wide as Scott Vogel’s with a ‘welcome home, brothers and sisters’. 



Review: Becca Grant.
Photo: Sofie Marsden (Death In Vogue Photos)



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