Karnivool, Sugar Army @ TheTivoli (20/06/09)

Tue 23rd Jun, 2009 in Gig Reviews

When your talking bands and music, the term – œsold out’ can often be a negative. But this is Karnivool’s Sound Awake Tour. It is completely sold out… But in the way most artists only wish for. Here in Brisbane, about as far from home as the lads can get, you can guarantee they could feel the love. That love was about to feel like an audible electric chair.

Four young men took the stage looking pretty damn pleased with themselves, and rightly so I guess. Perth has been the veritable melting pot of Australia’s musical talent for the better part of the last decade, and here was a band hand-selected by the arguable ‘cream’ of that delicious fondue. Sugar Army wasted no time in turning the capacity Tivoli crowd into instant fans. Their energised brand of rocking indie intensity has an irresistible catchiness. Tunes like Acute and Tongues In Cheeks have the perfect balance of suspense, spook, bash – œem-up-oomph and singable choruses. But it’s the Triple J favorite; And Now You’re Old Enough that really got the – œVool fans on side. Patrick, Jamie, Todd and Ian are Sugar Army, they’re from Perth and they’re bloody good.

The long awaited set, opening the long awaited tour, promoting the long awaited album Sound Awake was here. With an inverted pyramid of led-lights to the back, the Karnivool sound erupted through the Tivoli, circling through the balconies and ceiling beams. Ian Kenny stood powerfully at the centre. The altar. As if delivering the fiery final sermon, one of the most recognisable voices in Australian rock was soaring. Simple Boy and Goliath, two newies were early on the list and perfectly justified what all that fuss had been about. But then the cymbal lead intro was enough to warn of the old faithful to come. COTE put some evil smiles on faces and lead into a couple more tracks that proved that there’s no substitute for time on the CD player.

Just when the energy had hit the ceiling, Andrew Goddard thought it’d be a sensible idea to blow the roof and flattened distortion pedal for the tenacious trio Shutter Speed, Set Fire To The Hive and then, with a knowing look of – œFuck yeah how good is this!’ from Ian, crowd favorite Roquefort rolled out. And not to be too predictable and finish on the – œbig-one’, the clincher was old faithful, the hard-hitting monster, Themata.

Although the whole building wanted an encore more than anything, it was hard to see where they were going to pull out something more monsterous than the set they had just played. Except if they… Yep, played the emotional closer from Themata, Change (part 1) followed by the epic Change from the new album Sound Awake. If you were expecting a big show with a big sound, Karnivool would have actually made you shit yourself. Big sound, nasty as fuck riffs, drumming from hell and vocals like it was sung by the baddest kid in heaven.

Karnivool have sold out and if this show wasn’t a one off, they’ll continue to sell-out. God bless – œem.