Was it a bad sign to walk into the East Brunswick Club’s bandroom and see an empty room, along with a bunch of guys behind the mixing desk and a lone guitar player? Not at all, and those who weren’t in the room didn’t know what they were missing. Joe Foley, known to his friends as Extreme Wheeze politely sat on the stage with his legs crossed and a guitar strap over his shoulder opening the evening. Despite his acoustic rock being neither extreme nor wheezy, the tunes were excellent displaying careful guitar plucking and some fantastic howling from Foley’s voice box. The crowd participation element was also a nice surprise, where Wheeze asked punters to yell out numbers, to which he would play songs corresponding with a list of tunes he had on a scrap piece of paper. A nice way to start the evening and proof that it is sometimes good to show up early.

With local music it’s easy to find plenty of good acts that you’ve never heard of before, and just as many poor acts. Musically, Melbourne act Zond can be lumped into the good group – they play solid shoegaze meets grunge with an obvious Sonic Youth influence to their tunes. Drummer Tym Krasevac is exceptional, slamming down on the skins rapidly with faultless timing. But on a performance standpoint Zond were terrible, bordering on a “so bad it’s good” quality. It all started with guitarist Marney MacLeod yelling off-stage “Timmy for fuck stakes we were ‘sposed to start two minutes ago” and this kind of professionalism continued throughout the set. The band seemed to play without a set list, as there were a number of discussions on what song to play next after each song. When Justin Fuller lost place mid-song and looked to his bandmates for help, it was somewhat sad yet somewhat hilarious to watch him place his hand in front of his guitar only too look like he was strumming a tennis racket. On a whole, Zond’s set was thumbs in the middle.

“We are French Rockets from Western Australia” announced Carl Properjohn amid a sea of red spotlights and a puffing smoke machine, taking us on a journey of lo-fi post rock with the well-placed use of samplers. The three piece from Perth layered hypnotic flipped speech samples, trippy guitar and infectious percussion over the course of forty minutes. Of course, I’ve failed to mention the awesome light show put on by French Rockets with the simple use of lasers and spotlights. Red and green lasers created fireworks that spun and burst around the act while others flashed and moved from left to right in time. The songs may be a tad repetitive at times and some might feel that they go on for a tad too long, but together with the light show they make for an incredible package and one that must be seen by any music fan ASAP.

With the one hundred or so punters being the biggest crowd the EBC had seen all night, Baseball appeared and rushed through a set of favourites that got the crowd moving. While drummer Evelyn Morris looked frustrated and apologised for being a bit rusty on Land of Darkness – Land of Dogs, she provided perfect vocals on The Wedding At Susa. Frontman Cameron Potts screams as loud as he can during a spirited performance of Faith Like A Cross – Trust Like A Flag. Along with Soft Boy Factory and Mozart and the Whale being the better songs of their performance. Bass player Monika Fikerle and guitarist Ben Butcher spend much of the performance looking at the floor whilst playing their instruments well, but Fikerle and Morris switch for Man in the Machine and the night suddenly ends. Only thirty minutes have gone by and you are left want more – the sign of a good act, and ultimately the sign of a great headliner.