Regular John @ Enigma,Adelaide (20/06/09)

Wed 24th Jun, 2009 in Gig Reviews

Despite missing the first band due to a two-hour service delay at a North Adelaide restaurant that will remain unnamed, the three bands remaining on the bill would still have been well worth the cover charge, had I paid a cover charge that is. The punk rock invasion from Sydney was all set to rip the throats out of the small Enigma crowd and stomp them into the floor, but not until local boys From The Dead Sea blew some minds with their carefully crafted rock odysseys.

Adelaide instrumental maestro’s From The Dead Sea are a little different to your usual ambient fare. Closer to Mastodon’s progressive hard rock rumblings and with hints of pre-faggotry Wolfmother than most of the jazz-funk jam bands you see filling our live music venues and clogging the gutters. The trio smashed their way through an intense set, barely uttering a word and letting the music do all the talking. Drummer Ben Smith’s metronome-quality beats and guitarist Mathias’ flawless solos were only heightened by bassist Davison Jones’ effect pedal wizardry. As the reverb subsided at the end of the set and the boys dropped their instruments, I’m sure there would have been more than a few new converts in line to join their small, but intensely dedicated fan-club.

Young Sydney punk trio Talons were next to hit the stage. With From The Dead Sea’s personal cheer squad presumably downstairs drinking beer and fawning over their performance, Enigma’s band room was beginning to look even more bare than usual. It’s a damn shame too because Talons’ unique brand of post-punk melodies could see them absolutely blow up in the Australian music scene. Working with the small crowd lining the walls of the room as best as he could, lead vocalist and guitarist Christian Best screamed his way through a set full of material from their new album, with a couple of classics from their EP thrown in for good measure. With The Spew Song harkening back to the good old days of punk, and Gravitron showing off the maturity of Talons’ new material, the trio performed like a band with something to prove.

As the clock struck 12, it was time for the hard rock sing-a-longs and charming punk swagger of the boys from Regular John to send the now packed band room bat-shit crazy. The crowd that had suddenly assembled was an enigmatic mix of jock-rockers, ageing punks, and early thirties businessmen. Go figure. Regular John’s three front men shared the vocal duties throughout the set and, despite Brock Tengstrom apologising for a throat infection, the result was a powerful wall of shouts, screams, and carefully coordinated chants. One of the benefits of Enigma’s almost floor-level stage is the ability for crowd interaction, and the boys from Regular John certainly knew how to work it. The boys went on more than a few expeditions into the wall of thrashing bodies, Brock nearly losing his guitar at one point to some overzealous fans. The thrashing was the result of an incredibly tight set by the Sydney foursome, featuring tracks spanning all three records. The biggest tunes were Language and Abattoir Noir, both from the new album, proving a little exposure on Triple J can do wonderful things for your fan base.

After a swift encore demanded by a random male hijacking the microphone, I was left with ringing in my ears, the stench of man-sweat in my nostrils, and a feeling that I’d just seen three bands that will be going places.