Fear Of Comedy @ The CivicHotel, Perth (13/08/10)

Tue 17th Aug, 2010 in Gig Reviews

If you’re the superstitious sort, you probably made the mistake of staying at home on Friday night with all the doors locked. You really should have attended Tyranocorp’s latest extravaganza, Black, at the Civic Hotel instead. Even if there were semblances of bad luck throughout the night, the music emanating from the appropriately darkened room more than made up for it. The three very different bands, Like Junk, Mongrel Country and Fear Of Comedy gave their all even when faced with continuing struggles.

First to perform were three piece Like Junk, with their uniquely gothic style of post punk. Their piano driven menace was an interesting performance to take in. Although pianist Scott White was quite clearly directly from the school of Cave, he’s not quite up to that standard yet, but there’s room to grow into something close. Like Junk might not have been the most amazing band of the night, but they were still worth watching. Unfortunately, it didn’t last, after only 23 minutes on stage (and after a particularly impressive non-piano number), mic’s were cut, White pushed his keyboard over in anger, and thus ended the set.

Next were the incredible Mongrel Country, quite possibly one of Perth’s single most impressive bands right now. Describing their sound can prove to be an arduous task at the best of times. Noise rock with a distinctive western element, heavy country sludge straight from the swamp, the sound of murderous pigmen wielding instrumental weapons of terror… all these explanations come close, but just don’t quite capture the brilliance of Mongrel Country enough, and they’re even better live. Once again, the quintet didn’t disappoint and managed to blow the entire room away. Max Ducker (vocalist) was at his roaring best, as were the rest of the double drummer based unit. Curiously short on tracks from their latest self-titled release, the band decided to focus on new material instead. The highlight though was the epic closer Skin Of The Rhino, once more leaving the crowd battered afterwards. The lesson still stands, you don’t fuck with Max Ducker and his band of Mongrels.

Then Fear Of Comedy came along and finished everybody off. Although rarely gigging these days, the reason for this is that they’re creating new material and are working on a bigger return in the coming months. Black was a chance to try out some of this new material, and it must be said, what we heard was exciting stuff. Laith Tyranny (vocalist), although reportedly suffering from a nasty cold, gave it his all and still sounded great. The entire band was tight, and proved why they’re one of Western Australia’s most beloved bands. Unfortunately, the bad voodoo of Friday 13th returned, and after a knockout (though ‘less screamo’) performance of ‘Mirrors’, it all came to a crushing finale. It seemed Mr Tyranny was unable to continue (there had definitely been signs that he wasn’t coping as well as usual throughout the set), and neither could the band. Bassist Liam Adams brought his bass crunching down onto the stage, and the band made their farewells. Even on an off night, Fear Of Comedy greatly impressed an avidly watching audience. Watch out for when they return, the wait will be more than worth it.