The Twoks @ The Garden ofUnearthly Delights, Adelaide(08/03/11)

Wed 9th Mar, 2011 in Gig Reviews

Performing as a part of the Adelaide Fringe Festival in the world famous Spielgeltent, the venue was a soundscape created for a sound like The Twoks. With its billowing ceilings and the cool air, even the folks sitting in booths were airily taken aback when a woman with a fiery appearance took to the stage and started plucking on a wooden violin.

For the sound and experience that comes from a band with a name like The Twoks, the name just doesn’t do it justice.

With the sound of an Irish fiddle made entirely from a violin The Twoks are a band that on the 8th of March, needed no support act. Xani Kolac, the violinist was accompanied by Mark Leahy on drums and Stuart Taylor on bass guitar, although it was Xani’s attire that made her stand out way before she opened her mouth. Xani wore what seemed to be a wrist to ankle leotard engulfed with vibrant colours suggesting flaming tattoos, complimented by a red miniskirt that flicked with the wave of her hips every time certain chords were played.

The sound of the Twoks is impossible to categorize simply because of the use of the violin. It’s not everyday that an artist will use a wooden violin hooked up to an amp, but it wasn’t just an amp that was used to manipulate sound. At her feet Xani initiated kickloops that were made right before the audiences very eyes and ears! This gave Xani the chance to sing suggestively to the crowd in a sweetly seductive whisper. It was the combination of this that made the experience melodic and peaceful yet fast paced, with the help of the bass, tambourine chimes and drumming.

Some notable songs to keep your ears peeled for were Fix it and Happy Endings, that got hearts racing and feet tapping. Falling Sky sent the audience on a journey into overgrown fields in the summertime; while Flower brought the audience back to their seats with a magnetic baseline that got heads bopping. But it was the closer that sealed younger audience acceptance of The Twoks, with their own rendition of Justin Timberlake ’s Sexy Back. The violin created a slow moving energy that slithered around the Spiegeltent like a snake that yells ‘get your sexy on’. It is the combination of Spanish violin and traditional Irish Fiddle that creates a live show like no other. A statement that manages to remind this reviewer that she’d rather go blind than deaf because nothing beats the wondrous experience that is live music.