Nevereverland @ Music Bowl,Melbourne (14/12/08)

Fri 19th Dec, 2008 in Gig Reviews

The portents were not good for Nevereverland: torrential rain, Meredith stealing its thunder, a petulant Modular artist throwing a tanty, whispers of appalling ticket sales, a halving of the lineup and the pall of the first festival failure of the summer, Global Gathering, hanging over the music bowl. What everyone got was a good wholesome festival; nothing life transforming (like last year’s Daft Punk headlined festival), but some good sets by some good musos with a few moments of brilliance.

Van She, presumably because of the scheduling changes, were first up and had the ignominy of playing in front of only a few hundred. The crowd was giving them nothing other than a few nods and the occasional bounce, and they responded with a rather pedestrian set. It was a shame they did not play either Memory Man or The Sea because their atmospheric sound would have perfectly filled the cavernous space.

Ladyhawke took the stage next looking more Suzie Quattro than Stevie Nicks and her sound was more rocky than on her album, which could explain her sartorial choices. There was an awkward moment when her backing music would not paly and she engaged some stilted chit-chat but we were all there for her music. She opened with Professional Suicide and Manipulating Woman, the least melodic and most irritating two songs on her repertoire. Thankfully the more fun Dusk Till Dawn and Paris is Burning followed and she rounded her set off with a blazing My Delerium which set the now densely packed crowd in front of stage off.

German band, Whitest Boy Alive chilled things out from the delirious endings of LH, with their simpler more organic sound. The band was tightly packed at the front of the enormous music bowl stage with the drummer, Sebastian, side-on to the crowd. He laid down some very groovy beats and lead singer Erlend endeared himself to the crowd with constant and delicious Prussian inflected banter. The highlight was wild keys and guitar solos during Burning and their eminently enjoyable set showed how simple music done very well can be very good indeed. Despite playing a wonderful set I couldn’t help but be puzzled with the choice of band name given the country from where they come.

When crazy cats Hercules and Love Affair took the stage and all eyes were on Nomi’s pins – all six feet of them. You can imagine the sense of deflation when it was realised during Blind Nomi is a girl only in name. The local cool kids have been raving about Hercs and it was not clear they lived up to it. The album has nicely layered, understated and spartan sound but their live set seemed like a blur. Was it flawless segues or everything sounding the same? That said the horns were very tight and were unusually clear despite the famously muddy acoustics of the SMMB.

Everyone can more or less guess Cut Copy’s set given that they and The Presets have been somewhat omnipresent of late. Regardless of any ubiquity or predictability, their songs are tailor made for a festival and the punters lapped them up. Then characteristic jabby syths were giving everyone epilepsy, but that was a good thing. A coincidental (or ironic?) technical hitch before Haunted had no lasting affect and it was astonishing to watch virtually the entire crowd mouthing every lyric. The set surprisingly ended with Hearts on Fire and its lift nearly brought the house down.

By this stage the sun was setting on an unexpectedly pleasant afternoon and the evening was ushered in by the urgent wound-up sound of The Klaxons. Just like CC, the entire crowd was in full voice providing both the call and response to Golden Skans. The kids also appreciated Atlantis to Interzone and Gravity’s Rainbow. The enthusiasm from the crowd was infectious and even the pretty types eventually got into the set.

With darkness ensuing, the kids snapped their glow sticks and The Presets made the crowd go crazy when they talk talk talk talked like like like that that, uhoh! Like the true Nevereverland performers they are (they supported Daft Punk at the last year) did not disappoint. The Presets pleased with the ARIA and J award winning beats of Apocalypso and everything that has made one of Australian’s hottest exports since their conception in 2003. There’s no point listing any tracks because we all know what they played. But the absolute thrill on Kim Moyes face when he got the crowd bouncing to his beat was genuine and you could see that the Presets were as excited to play as the kids were to dance!

Like the night the crowd was good but not great with smatterings of haute couture, bogans, muscles and teenagers. Last year’s Nevereverland was all about Daft Punk and this years was all about… Modular’s 10th birthday? The paying public are not that gullible but it was certainly a good day.

CHECK THE PIX HERE