Darren Hanlon @ The Fly ByNight, Fremantle (05/03/11)

Tue 8th Mar, 2011 in Gig Reviews

Fremantle’s Fly By Night Club had the perfect setting for romance. To the left and the right of the stage there were half a dozen small round tables, red tablecloths and lit candles. First to take the stage was 6s & 7’s a contemporary blues folk band from Perth. With confident stage presence and little chitchat, the six piece charged through their set without a hitch and without much response from the modest crowd of people sitting cross-legged on the ground.

As punters were probably half expecting another support act to come onto the stage, Darren Hanlon stepped out to a delayed applause. With a crackle of his electric guitar Hanlon started the evening with Elbows. Hanlon wooed the audience with both songs and persona. He is known for his songs about completely ordinary topics, but with words and wit he cleverly stitches them together to make a masterpiece that will make you think, appreciate the little things and chuckle while saying: “That’s so true!”

The laughs kept on rolling after She Cuts Hair with a session of interaction with the crowd. The crowd surely fell in love with this charming man in an instant. If Only My Heart Were Made of Stone was a sweet, heart-melting duet with Shelly Short. With a beautiful country twang of the guitar, Hanlon’s distinct, nasal Australian accent and Short’s elegant and soft breathy vocals, the two fused together in great harmony.

Hanlon struck gold for the night with loud applause for Folk Insomnia followed by a rendition of Here Comes the Sun with a twist: it’s from the point of view of a vampire. A self-indulgent mash up of The Sex Pistols and The Clash after Punk’s Not Dead was thoroughly enjoyed by punters as well. Hanlon kept teasing the audience with a ukulele version of The Beatles’ Black Bird but we never got past the seductive instrumental prologue. Instead he gave us Modern History from the latest released I Will Love You at All (2010)

For an encore, Hanlon picked up a banjo to play Falling Aeroplanes. He explained that the banjo was purchased from Ebay UK with some slight faults, but Hanlon and all his imperfections, sounded so exquisite. An older tune, Electric Skeleton had girls up and dancing straight away. The night ended pleasantly, punters left with a smile on their faces and a simple melody stuck in their heads.

Photo by Anthony Tran