Eddy Current Suppression Ring,The UV Race @ The PalaceTheatre, Melbourne(16/04/2010)

Tue 20th Apr, 2010 in Gig Reviews

Check out photos from the Palace here

Girl duo Super Wild Horses warmed up the smattering of super-early punters with their minimalistic, garage tunes. Amy Franz and Hayley McKee took turns at playing primal guitar riffs and mesmerizing drums (and later one of them added a keyboard into the mix). Some of their tunes sounded more like cheerleaders spelling out chants to a soundtrack of discordant instruments, but they are most definitely not a novelty band to be ignored. While some in the crowd seem to be a bit put off by the brevity of their songs or their occasional lack of timing, Super Wild Horses feel like a band that is perhaps a few choruses and verses short of gritty brilliance. File under “sounds like lost studio recordings from Siouxsie and The Banshees”.

Now, how does one describe the second support band of the night, The UV Race? Words like bizarre and odd come to mind, but mostly naked. Their set started with a group of properly dressed but face-painted individuals on the guitar, bass, drums, keys and harmonica – pretty standard set so far. Then when we all expected one of the clothed musicians to start singing, a slightly chubby and mostly naked man ran out from backstage and hijacked the microphone. Said man was singer Marcus Rechsteiner, wearing nothing but lace gloves, modified underpants, a skeleton duct taped to his chest and a party mask, with the words “WAITING FOR THE PERFECT MAN” drawn on his belly. Rechsteiner explained to the crowd, “This is a great set for attention. I love attention. I’m an attention seeker.”On paper it sounds like this could be one of those obnoxiously pretentious experimental bands, but it was quite the opposite.

Describing themselves as “proto-punk” on their Triple J Unearthed page may seem arrogant to some, but more definitely the most succinct way to illustrate their rough-around-the-edges and unpretentious brand of punk. It was refreshing to hear Rechsteiner sing with an undisguised Australian accent about waiting under the clocks at Flinders Street Station, but perhaps a little hard to appreciate The UV Race while he danced about near-naked like a chicken. It seemed that much of the crowd had difficulty taking the band seriously, with one punter yelling out, “That was terrible!” after they finished.

It was pretty clear that Eddy Current Suppression Ring was the headlining band of the night: the Palace was packed shoulder to shoulder with punters and even the top two balconies were lined with fans; two projectors reeled scenes that were in the theme with their current album art and a banner with “RUSH TO RELAX” in red lettering hung over the stage. Drummer Danny Young and guitarist Mikey Young came onstage looking quite relaxed in pyjamas and a fluffy bath robe, while bassist Brad Barry and vocalist Brendan Huntley were suited up to the nines in dapper attire. But Barry and Huntley were in a great Rush To Relax, only taking them one song to start stripping off their suits to reveal matching outfits more suited to a slumber party than a stage.

During their intense set that went for more than an hour and a half, the boys from Ormond plummeted their way through punk garage songs like Memory Lane, Tuning Out, Second Guessing, Sunday’s Coming, Walked Into A Corner, Which Way To Go, Isn’t It Nice and I Can Be A Jerk. With adorable lyrics like, “I’ll cook you dinners that you like to eat with lots of veggies if you don’t eat meat”, it’s hardly surprising that a girl (presumably Huntley’s significant other) came out and gave him a hug during the romantic Gentleman.

It’s a known fact that Huntley suffers from stage fright, and all throughout the night he seemed anxious, jittering constantly up and down the stage. It was only during their performance of the excellent Colour Television that the singer seemed to finally relax. In the most incredible feat of the night, the pyjama-and-golf-gloving wearing man leaped out on the punters’ shoulders and started crowd surfing and giving directions (“I want to go that way!”) to those underneath him. With the help of obliging punters, Huntley managed to work his way up to the top most balcony of the Palace with a microphone lead that seemed to go on forever. They may be named after an Eddy Current Suppression Ring, but these boys sure as hell don’t suppress any energy when they play live.