Calling All Cars, NumbersRadio @ Corner Hotel,Melbourne (18/09/2010)

Thu 23rd Sep, 2010 in Gig Reviews

Numbers Radio are your average three piece alt-rock band, except not quite. With a penchant for muted strings, punchy basslines and a lot of sliding power chords the group owe a certain debt to bands like Green Day without fitting a prototypically punk mould. Lead singer Dave Orr’s voice is a pitchy affair, occasionally reminiscent of Billy Talent’s Ben Kowalewicz and with an appropriately yelping quality befitting their accomplished pacey rock and roll.

Entering the fray at the relatively late time of 10.30, the youngsters are treated to a surprisingly dismal opening attendance when they shuffle onto the Corner Hotel reduced size stage. Playing with a relaxed and unpretentious approach to performance, Numbers Radio demonstrate a Children Collide-esque ability to transform their uncomplicated power pop into something edgy and interesting in the live arena. Radio favourite Automatic is a prime example; it’s mechanical, stop-start break downs coming to life in rambunctious form, while new single Josephine allows bassist Robbie Carlyon to reveal his considerable vocal talents.

Their formula may be tried and tested, but by dropping an increasingly eclectic set which develops a refreshing union of rocky thrash and focussed song craft, Numbers Radio represent some of the best elements from the new crop of Australian rock groups.

Conversely, Calling All Cars may engender all that’s wrong with the rock scene. ‘May’, because in seeing them live there is a major conflict between what happens onstage and what happens on the floor. Apparently still fresh from a career highlight support slot for AC/DC, the band are as immodest live as they are ballistic on record; lead singer Haydn Ing gurning and crotch thrusting his way repugnantly through even the most pedestrian of instrumental sections between vocal duties.

Aware of the modest success of their Triple J favoured lead singles, CAC ask the audience to sing along and ‘go wild’ in the pit to songs like the impassioned Hold, Hold Fire, and, despite the preening and posing evident before them, the gathered masses oblige unequivocally, throwing their hands and bodies around as the integral energy of the song powers through the polished veneer of the performance.
Runaway is another example of the band’s ability to write and perform powerful, addictive rock music with its breaking staccato drum beat, while the rawness of Disconnect lends itself to an all out dancing brawl on the Corner floor.

And yet, this rawness is something that is ultimately missing from the set to be replaced by pomposity and self-satisfaction. At times the whole band is vacantly open-mouthed in the midst of a portrayal of ‘rock-star’ face, while during his brief turn with a vibraphone mid-set, Ing exudes all the mindless contentment of a little boy farting in the bath tub.

Perhaps the best indicator of the gig’s ambivalent nature is new song When Worlds Collide, which meanders along aimlessly with no recognised or memorable hook but keeps security busier than they must have been all year fighting the torrents of crowd surfers and stage divers who bombard the miniature platform. Calling All Cars are undoubtedly a fan’s band, and their faux-rock star clichés do seem to strike a chord with a section of their fanbase, but it would be much more interesting to see them perform in a grittier manner more becoming a semi-hardcore band with appropriate aspirations.

CHECK OUT PHOTOS FROM THE NIGHT HERE