You know that when you wake up with ears still ringing and a stupid grin on your face that you’ve been to a really good gig the night before. And if you’re off to a Regurgitator gig, the odds that you’ll be wearing a stupid gig are pretty odds-on. This particular reviewer has seen the band live roughly 10 times, with not a bad show amongst them.

The Pre-Teen Braves wander on stage in front of a small crowd. Surely you’ve seen them in Vice magazine by now? Four high school girls laden with a drum kit, keyboard and some maracas, chanting about the virtues of not missing your train, ham, cheese and tomato sandwiches and a friend who moved to the beach. It’s all very cute and catchy. Sure, it doesn’t have longevity, but who cares? Having supported pop maestros The Unicorns the night previous, and also with a Magic Dirt support under their collective belt, the only way is up. Closing up their twenty-minute set with Teacher Song (which coincidentally seems to come up on ‘random play’ on my iPod more than most other songs, but that’s a different story…), The Pre-Teens left most of the crowd smiling and the burly, beer-swilling guys in front of me wondering what it was all about.

Brisbane’s The Grates are up next and once again, their energetic rock/pop impresses. I saw them support TISM in Melbourne in November and found myself extolling their virtues to others, and I’ll continue to do so. With the pop sensibilities of Elastica, the no-bass ethos of the White Stripes, the female singer and drummer lineup of Your Wedding Night and with vocalist Patience possessing the charisma of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Karen O, The Grates embody everything great about pop music – catchy choruses, nice hooks – and they look like they’re having the time of their lives on stage. They’re tight despite having driven from Adelaide that afternoon, and by the end of their set, several crowd members have taken up that elusive spot in between the stage and the five metre radius everyone leaves.

Put simply, Regurgitator are one of the country’s finest live bands. I’d be hard pressed to list a handful of bands who produce such excellently entertaining shows on a regular basis. The band’s wealth of killer singles was displayed on 2002’s best of Jingles, and opening with the formidable back-to-back combination of I Sucked A Lot Of Cock To Get Where I Am, I Wanna Be A Nudist, I Will Lick Your Arsehole and Everyday Formula, it’s obvious that the band could easily perform an entire set of crowd favourites. Considering that they also threw in Black Bugs, Kong Foo Sing, ! (The Song Formerly Known As), FSO and Track 1, you could be (almost) forgiven for forgetting that they have a new album to flog.

The new, bubble-produced MishMash! songs all blend seamlessly into the set, with bassist Ben Ely taking the reigns for My Computer Crashed and My Friend Robot. For Shopping Mall Soul, Quan Yeomans invites punter Dan – who played the song’s solo on the record – on stage to replicate it live. Dan obliges while Yeomans jumps in the crowd to clap and cheer, and at the conclusion of the solo, Ely tells Yeomans he’s out of the band and Quan walks off to the band room while Dan stands up on the drum riser finishing off the song. It’s great fun.

The Game sounds fantastic live, with drummer Pete Kostic doing an effortlessly brilliant job keeping in time with the loops. Latest single The Drop is greeted by the crowd just as well as any of the band’s previous singles, and it sounds great live.

Anyone who has seen the band’s Live At Festival Hall, Brisbane video, with the Regurgitator, TISM and The Fauves encore would know that Regurgitator are no strangers to all-star encores – and tonight’s encore proper (following a faux “pretend we’ve just gone off stage and we’ll play another song” one of Kong Foo Sing) of C’mon sees The Grates and the Pre-Teen Braves return to the stage, as well as 30-40 punters who get up on stage to dance. With that, the band are gone after yet another stellar Melbourne performance. My only gripe was the size of the crowd. Sure, it was a Sunday night close to Christmas, but a 50% full Corner Hotel to see one of Australia’s best bands launching a great new album is not good enough. Maybe Melbournians suffered ‘Gurge overload after seeing them record MishMash! each day during their lunch breaks. Maybe they were too busy buying copies of Get Born as Christmas presents for all of the 18 Australians who don’t yet own it. Regardless, Regurgitator’s next Melbourne gig is a must-see. Trust me.