Old and grizzled punks with shaven heads and Ramones t-shirts and middle-aged outer urban yuppies in blue jeans make an odd combination, but this is the sort of audience that the Clash of the Titans – three of Australia’s best bands of the 70s and 80s – has drawn to the brooding ambiance of the Basement Bar of the Acacia Ridge Hotel tonight.
First up in this no-holds barred musical battle are the Stems – classy exponents of shimmering 60s-style guitar garage-pop and undoubtedly one of the finest outfits to ever emerge from Perth. And from get-go to close, they’re firing on all cylinders, winning new fans and charming old ones. Dom Mariani’s vocals are rich and golden while Richard Lane’s guitar shivers with so-beautiful-you-need-to-hear-it 60s pop sensibilities and the rhythm section of Julian Matthews and Dave Shaw play with energy, panache and a sense of fun that musicians half their age would envy. It’s glorious, and the occasional injections of harmonica and keys from Mariani and Matthews make it even more jaw-droppingly perfect.
It’s perhaps testimony to their self confidence that they open with something new, but the mighty cheers that greets the conclusion of the fat, bluesy sound of Leave You Way Behind proves the faith is not at all misplaced. And they keep it up by not only mixing old and new in equal amounts, but by skipping over major hit At First Sight. Still, the unashamedly retro keys of Tears Me In Two, plus Mariani’s swaggering mid-song solo and Lane’s soulful harmonica breakdown on Make You Mine more than compensate for the lack.
Hellbound Train continues to spruik the aural delights of just-released long-player Heads-Up, but it’s She Sees Everything that’s the showstopper – old yet new, evoking the early blues-rock of the Rolling Stones and the Kinks. By the time they wrap up with Sad Girl – a joyous blast from the past for anyone who was watching Countdown back in 1987 – they’ve undoubtedly left many wishing that they were the headline act!
Proto punksters Radio Birdman are next into the ring to go 12 rounds with the crowd, but for the first four or so songs it feels like they’ve forgotten to tie on the gloves properly. The mix is as wobbly and disjointed as white-haired frontman Rob Younger’s epileptic, brink-of-collapse dancing. It’s all a bit surreal from such a seminal band, but just when a train wreck seems in the offing everything starts to come good.
Younger sheds the black leather vest he’s wearing and poses aggressively as the band kicks in Descent into the Maelstrom. Instantly, the band oozes newfound poise and a rediscovered straight-shooting rhythm – the drums of You Am I’s Russell Hopkinson leading the assault. Later, Denik Tez sweats furiously over his buzzsaw guitar solos during Love Kills. It’s a wonder he can hit any of the notes for all the perspiration dripping from him, but the riffs emerge as darkly glorious as Younger’s menacing lyrics. The intensity climbs as We’ve Come So Far (To Be Left Behind) and Locked Up detour us through 2006 release Zeno Beach, before the band crescendos with the ever-popular Aloha Steve and Danno and New Race. It’s an amazing turnaround: the fist-waving crowd screams “Yeah hup!” while Younger glares about venomously and shouts “I’m really gonna punch you out” over and again. Knock-out stuff.
The final contenders in this super-heavyweight bout of musical Australiana are Hoodoo Gurus. You don’t need to be a hardcore fan to be familiar with these quintessential purveyors of the pub rock genre, just to have lived through the 80s or early 90s, and with Dave Faulkner’s evergreen voice at the helm, ably supported by Brad Shepherd’s inch-perfect guitar, the set grooves along with unadulterated brilliance.
Singles flow thick and fast throughout the 90-minute set: classic compositions such as I Want You Back, The Right Time, Bittersweet, Miss Freelove ‘69, Come Anytime and What’s my Scene get the crowd pumping. 1,000 Miles is one of the very few slower tempo songs of the night – a nostalgia-soaked lyrical journey that even Crowded House would be honoured to play. Form a Circle sees Shepherd leading the vocals while Poison Pen makes an unusually early appearance, considering it’s normally an encore song.
But it’s the non-singles that really star tonight – and if Faulkner’s plane-crashing guitar scrapings are the perfect accompaniment to set-closer I Was A Kamikaze Pilot, it’s the dark bass lines and graveyard-humour lyrics of Dig it Up that are the highlight of the night.
And when the foursome return to the stage to reprise with Like Wow – Wipeout and Where Nowhere Is, the evening is truly complete – and the crowd laid out stone-cold on the floor. Honestly, if you missed out, you really did miss out.
