The Sons of Katie Elder opened to a small crowd at The Greenroom with tracks including Up All Night and These Streets. The cool Sydney foursome played a laidback set of country infused rock but a couple of broken guitar strings forced them to stop midway and borrow a guitar courtesy of The Gin Club. Greg and Johnny both took lead vocals in a few songs and entertained the crowd with small talk, reminding them of The Greenroom’s policy of no crowd surfing, just in case we were considering it. All jokes aside, The Sons of Katie Elder admitted this was their worst gig ever and this had everyone thinking – Where the bloody hell are you Canberra?

Just when you thought most of the crowd was probably just made up of members from The Gin Club, numbers slowly picked up after 10 pm.

The Julian Abrahams Band was a refreshing change for the night playing punchy rock tracks to wake up the crowd. The trio from Canberra was lead by front man and experimentalist Julian Abrahams from Casual Projects fame. Abrahams’ unique voice and enthusiasm was a pleasure to watch and made you take notice, prompting the first crowd reactions for the night. They played the honest Good For You and drifted between rock, reggae and funk sounds with a tad bit of scatting in between, even touching on the blues with the standout track Speaking In My Sleep. The gracious performer thanked the crowd and confessed it was the second time he’s played solo with his new band, which explained the odd presence of a music stand on The Greenroom stage. The locals are definitely one to keep an ear out for around town.

The small crowd had grown and slowly crept their way up the front by the time The Gin Club emerged on stage. Appearing only as a quintet tonight, the indie folk rockers opened with the awesome track Days and bombarded The Greenroom with Angus’ insanely loud drumming, giving the fifty or so crowd a taste of what’s to come. Those who aren’t familiar with The Gin Club lineup, would be surprised to see the four guitarists each taking over on lead vocals, sometimes swapping the bass for the keyboard or the guitar for the drums which continued throughout the night for every song, with band members discussing amongst themselves “Do you want to play guitar next man?”.

Playing mainly songs from new double LP and third album Junk including An Horse and Gas Guzzler the four guitars and a range of other instruments created a multilayered sound like no other. When Ben takes lead vocals for Something Rotten, he tells the audience that Tim Rogers sang it on their album and jokes that he can sing it better, with one of the others adding “Tim couldn’t make it”. Ten Paces Away was a crowd favourite with a few getting up and dancing, but one of the night’s highlights was when Ola took to the vocals for Abigail and announced that this gig would probably be his last for a while before going back to Sweden. He dedicated the track to his fellow band members which prompted hugs all round on stage at the end of the song. Another standout was the acapella style of the beautiful You, Me & The Sea which got the crowd’s full attention. The Gin Club, a band of truly talented storytellers, musicians and songwriters, ended the night with the infectious old favourite Wylde Bitch and in terms of live music, The Gin Club is a good as it gets.