The London based rock outfit have come Down Under to tour their original debut album, Silent Alarm, and man am I happy about it. They played old tunes, new tunes, slow tunes, insane tunes, basically just a consistent string of ridiculously delightful tunes.
Opening the night we had artsy girls Haiku Hands. I’d heard these chicks milling around on Triple J quite a bit over the past year, so I was interested to catch them live. Originally, I wasn’t too sure if they would fit the bill for Bloc Party, but once we were a few songs in I was like ‘ohhhh yeah I get it now’. They were confident, creative, and totally bloody crazy, with their songs preaching femme power and pooploads of fun. The crowd started off small, but gradually grew as people began to get sucked in by the girls’ infectious energy. Their fluro outfits were fire, as were their synchronized dance moves, and they even flung out a bunch of streamers at one point. The Haiku chicks popped out songs such as ‘Squat’, ‘Jupiter’ and ‘Not About You’, before finishing off with a universally relatable tune involved the phrase ‘fuck this shit’. Fab.
Between sets I made sure to neck as much water as I could, mostly because the stage’s smoke machine was closing up my airways, but also because I needed to moisten my throat for some serious ‘woo’ing. We’d managed to grab ourselves a spacious spot directly in front of a giant stack of speakers, so immense amounts of musical brain-throbbing was bound to occur, however as soon as Bloc Party hit the room, I welcomed the pain with open ears. The band started off with slow burner ‘Compliments’, turning the room into a forest of swaying punters. The misty, mellow vibes continued as they played ‘Plans’, before throwing us all into a bass-driven boogie with ‘Price of Gasoline’.
One of the things that stood out to me the most (other than how fricken sensational Bloc Party are live) was actually the lighting. There were crazy white strobes for the fast tunes, and dark purple tones for the more ominous ones. It all made so much sense and accented the music very well! But of course, good lighting can only be appreciated if there’s something for it to shine on, and dayum did we get to see something beautiful. Frontman Kele has such a remarkable voice; even his normal speaking voice is bloody nice to listen to! His hard-ass spunky facial expressions during songs were just as entertaining as the music itself, with his beastly stares forcing the crowd to jump a little harder.
As the night partied on, we got to hear more 2005-era masterpieces, including ‘Banquet’ (*cue Guitar Hero flashbacks), ‘Luno’, ‘Helicopter’, ‘She’s Hearing Voices’ and the heart-tingling tune ‘This Modern Love’. The latter was met with a five-thousand-person backing choir and a sky full of confetti, so that was pretty incredible. Each band member was tackling their instrument with absolute precision, meshing the sounds together so flawlessly that I was honestly convinced it sounded better than the original album. The roaring bass lines vibrated every limb, and the twangy guitar complimented Kele’s low velvety voice to about the same calibre as mustard complimenting a pickle. If you know me well, you’ll know those are two of my absolutely favourite foods so that’s a HUGE statement for me to make, and I bloody stick by it! The most impressive person on stage, however, was killer drummer Louise, who is now sitting up there in my personal Top 10 Musical Women of The Year list. God she was so cool, violently chipping away at that drumkit like a wild crop-topped animal. Controlling the beat to such quirky, off-kilter songs isn’t easy, especially when you’re trying to smash out backing vocals at the same time, but she made it look totally sinch. You’re a mellifluous gem Louise.
Eventually the band exhausted their Silent Alarm playlist and went off to have a breather, returning soon after to slap us with a quick bunch of more recent snacks. On came huge 2012 hit ‘Octopus’, punching it’s groovy tentacles into all of our eager ears. The entire pavilion went nuts as heavenly rock tune ‘The Prayer’ entered the scene, and there wasn’t a still bod in the room as hectic song ‘Ratchet’ closed out the night. They gave us all a bow as we gave them cheer, and that was the end of my beautiful Bloc Party experience!
No comments:
Post a Comment