Death Cab For Cutie @Thebarton Theatre, Adelaide(22/02/09)

Fri 27th Feb, 2009 in Gig Reviews

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Indie darlings Death Cab For Cutie, if you hadn’t quite noticed, are hardly indie darlings anymore. They have ventured far beyond a genesis as the side project for singer/songwriter/guitarist Ben Gibbard, so much so that these days one doesn’t need to be overly interested in music to know who they are, or to notice that their work permeates so much of modern American television aimed at the late teen/young adult market. Two albums have now passed since they left the haven of Barsuk Records for Atlantic – home to Metallica, Phil Collins and Led Zeppelin to name a few. Yet on stage, perhaps helped at Thebarton Theatre by a not quite sold-out crowd and a stage and lights set-up that was plainly rudimentary, they remain a great band to be admired, not a ruddy great corporate giant to gawp at.

Gibbard, Chris Walla (guitar), Nicholas Harmer (bass) and Jason McGerr (drums) do not exude a great deal of charisma from their posts on the theatre’s wide stage, and Gibbard’s banter never extends far beyond a few well-mannered instances of – œhow’re you doing?’. They play beautifully though, starting out with the slow build of – œBixby Canyon Bridge’, the opener from their most recent album Narrow Stairs. Its mixture of charming pop and more grandiose, anthemic intentions is repeated across the evening, with each song working on variations of the power pop/rock format first coined by Big Star in the 1970s and taken out into ever weirder and more challenging – though no more tuneful – directions ever since. Next it was into the strains of – œThe New Year’, one of numerous tunes to be picked out of their star-making 2003 set Transatlanticism, an album they probably have not collectively topped since. This is not to say Death Cab’s other material is weaker, for there is hardly a song in the catalogue that does not merit at least some interest.

Midway through the evening there arrived a one-two punch of tracks to rival most any band to have strapped on a guitar with melodic/hypnotic intentions. First was Soul Meets Body, another ideal encapsulation of the Death Cab ethic that was also the group’s highest charting US single, Gibbard’s acoustic guitar lines adding to a warm mix. This was followed by I Will Possess Your Heart, an epic ode to obsessional, unrequited love that builds for several minutes before the vocals – creepy in an Every Breath You Take kind of way – latch on to the pulsing groove. From there the crowd was in the palm of Gibbard’s hand, ready for more epics but also quite happy to bound along to the radio-friendly ditty The Sound Of Settling.

Encore time began with Gibbard, acoustic and unaccompanied, crooning his way through I Will Follow You Into The Dark, a promise to a loved one that had the lighters, sorry, mobile phones, swaying wistfully across the room. Title And Registration was dedicated somewhat bizarrely but nonetheless endearingly to the town of Kingston by Walla, before the group brought their night to a close with a shattering rendition of Transatlanticism, a ballad so well pitched it has no need to speed up for anybody. So well did they finish that it took some time to realise that at 20 songs and little more than 80 minutes, the band could have played on for another 25 minutes without usurping Thebarton’s sharp 11pm curfew. Still, it is always better to leave a crowd baying for more, rather than no more, isn’t it?

CHECK OUT ALL THE PHOTOS HERE