Weddings, Parties, Anything,The Gin Club, The Fauves @ ThePalace, Melbourne (25/09/2010)

Tue 28th Sep, 2010 in Gig Reviews

Weddings, Parties, Anything are a band whose voice speaks of to a great mass of this country. It’s Irish folk rock with an Australian accent and, without being condescending, it’s probably as close as this country has had to a working man’s band. Through their punk rock ethos, a focus on narrative-driven lyrics and a true ear for the dramatic (many songs are built around the core interplay between piano accordion and fiddle), the Weddoes marry solid musicality with real-world sentiment. It’s music sung with a gravelly voice and strummed with grease under the fingernails. Fitting, then, that they host an annual get together in Melbourne on the eve of the great people’s leveller, the AFL Grand Final.

A rousing intro by RockWiz’s Brian Nankervis leads into the opening set by 90s pop-rocker’s The Fauves. Admittedly I’d had just a passing interest in this group in their heyday – their humorous slice-of-life vignettes of suburbia held little appeal then and even less now. The only relief from the pedestrian crunchy guitars and tired vocals was the familiar Hot Nairobi Nights closer, building and filling the cavernous Palace Theatre interior and curiously showed enough energy to elicit a crowd call for more.

The growing mass of the The Gin Club is greeted by a growing mass in the venue, and the band set about staking its claim as one of the must-see acts on the live circuit. The Gin Club spiel is one relatively well known – a huge gaggle multi-instrumentalist members who swap instruments and genres throughout the gig, yet still managing to weave a compelling and heartfelt story. Lead by band leader Ben Salter , the merry troupe at various times boasts multiple guitars, two keyboards, cello and many songs with a dedicated tambourinist. The set was punctuated with offerings from their earth-shattering new album Deathwish, including an endearing rendition of Book of Poison, a tale written by Salter’s farmer brother-in-law and delivered with stripped bare honesty, tinged with genuine awe and humility in front of the appreciative crowd. Set closers Wylde Bitch and Drug Flowers were true joys to behold, with a crystal clear mix allowing an uncluttered insight into the intricate interplay between the competing instruments. With a crowd made up of vocal and one-eyed “Wedheads”, it was always going to be a tough ask to push through, but the Ginners did, and proved why they’ve earned the praise as one of Australia’s finest musical offerings of the moment.

Six microphones were set up for the band affectionately known as the Weddoes, and a semi a-capella opener of their 1995 breakthrough hit Wide Open Road utilised each of them. The six-vocal attack was a hopeless match for the mass of singing voices, however, in a theme of overt crowd participation which would take over the evening and provide an air of rapturous celebration. That celebration often saw the crowd excitement spill over from humorous eagerness (the forceful pegging of coins during the line “10 cents short of a dollar” in Tickets for Tatts ), to scary exuberance as middle aged men with a skinful moshed and crowd surfed to duelling piano accordion and fiddle solos.

The celebratory air was mirrored on-stage as well, with long-banished member Dave Steel welcomed back into the fold as a guest guitarist and vocalist. Steel was a member from the mid to late 1980s, but quit the band after a US tour claiming exhaustion. Wedheads murmured about the tension between Steel – a solid singer-songwriter in his own right – and charismatic band leader Mick Thomas; it’s true enough that Steel had not been involved in any of the Weddoes numerous reformations and one-off shows. This was billed as his first time with the band in more than 20 years, and it showed with a tentative and introspective opening to 1988’s haunting Laughing Boy. The crowd picked up on the vibe early in the song and were wary and subdued, until they brought it all back in again for the blazing chorus.

This was a gig for the devoted, that was clear. The room was full of middle aged men keen for their irregular, but cherished hit of their unique band. And it was clear why early on: there are few, if any, musical contemporaries who speak so clearly and lucidly to the stoic, romanticised view of what it means to be an Aussie bloke. A tale of miner’s struggles in Industrial Town, for example, is etched with the image of the bronzed, down-trodden worker, while Father’s Day is a heart-wrenching tale of a man keeping his chin up when times are tough. Lighter moments are played with a straight bat; Monday’s Experts, Glory Days and Away, Away are great exponents of guitar pop and are well placed throughout the set to relieve the tension. The gig is clearly built on reminiscent romance, but it’s romance without being trite and heartfelt without being naff. It’s clearly struck a chord with an audience who, nearly 25 years since they first kicked off, can still fill a cavern the size of The Palace with a booming sing-a-long chorus.