Melbourne support act Calling All Cars were forced to cancel their performance on Saturday night due to lead singer Haydn Ing coming down with a bad case of the flu. This last minute decision to pull out left the crowd confused whilst venue management played bad dance music right up until 9:15pm even though doors opened at 7:30pm, in an effort to fill in time.
After an excruciatingly long wait Adelaide band Secrets In Scale took to the stage. With the crowd already tipsy after killing time by going to the bar, this local band got a reasonably good response from the crowd. The three members of the band made quite a bizarre match with Lead singer David McGuire all dressed up a sparkly long sleeved shirt (reminiscent of Daniel Johns circa Neon Ballroom) whilst bassist Doug McGinn looked more like he had just come from chopping wood in his flannelette shirt and white single top. Apart from the mish-mashed attire Secrets In Scale played a decent show apart from the fact that McGuire’s singing could hardly be heard over the top of the music.
After another wait (and almost choking from all the smoke machines)*Birds Of Tokyo* band members entered onto the stage one after another as the venue filled with screams and cheers. The boys leaped straight into their set, which consisted of sixteen songs in total, starting off with Broken Bones. Lead vocalist and occasional guitarist Ian Kenny, who also does vocals for Karnivool, has an incredibly gifted voice that he is able to project without much effort. Bassist Anthony Jackson sported a shaved head and long wiry chin beard making him look amazingly similar to Anthrax guitarist Scott Ian.
All four guys gave it their all with Jackson and Adam Spark thrashing their guitars around whilst the Adam Weston pounded his drums and nodded his head. In between songs Kenny repeatedly told the crowd how thankful he was that they all come out to see them play live, which offcourse got the crowd even more pumped. All sixteen songs played where a pleasant mix of both LP’s Day One and Universes with the band waiting till the end to play more popular songs like Off Kilter. Sing along favourites were Wayside and the hugely successful Silhouettic with Kenny placing his microphone close to the crowd so they could be heard.
The band used many lighting effects to create the mood, but they did not rely on them too much which was a nice change. Sometimes bands use smoke and mirrors to hide the fact that they don’t actually have any talent or substance, but not the Birds for they have a wealth of talent that can’t be disguised. Also at concerts you get the impression that the band is holding back until the last few songs so they can leave on a high note, but this was not so with Birds Of Tokyo as Kenny, Spark, Weston and Jackson gave everything they had to each and every song. During the whole set they did not stop once.
Their performance at The Gove spells the end of their Universes tour so unless you scored tickets to the Pyramid Rock Festival, fans will have to wait until next year to see the Birds soar once more.
