Papa Vs Pretty, Last Dinosaurs@ The Edinburgh Castle,Adelaide (26/03/11)

Mon 28th Mar, 2011 in Gig Reviews

Summer may be well and truly behind us now but Adelaide was treated to a moment of nostalgia last night as three artists who all featured heavily in my ‘summer playlist’ rolled into town. If the highly anticipated co-headliners Papa Vs. Pretty and the Last Dinosaurs weren’t enough, local band (and current favourites) The Salvadors support slot pretty much had me giddy with excitement.

And it seems I wasn’t alone either, with The Ed Castle of late really struggling to attract a decent-sized crowd for their Saturday night gigs, tonight’s epic line-up proved to be strong enough to boast one of the largest crowds I’ve seen there in a long time.

The Salvadors are certainly one of the most popular bands to have come out of Adelaide in recent years. Their ridiculously catchy brand of “summery indie pop” is a proven winner with local crowds, with them having opened Big Day Out earlier in the year. And if tonight’s crowd size for them (considering they were just a support act) is anything to go by, they’re showing no signs of slowing down. Opening with new single Eliza Jane, the crowd were instantly moving and shaking to the catchy guitar hooks and infectiously danceable beats. They followed up with the equally infectious Westfield before knocking out some unfamiliar tracks (their commentary in between songs was completely inaudible with their microphones inexplicably cutting out every 3 seconds). They closed their set with crowd favourite’s Wilson and Atacama Disco, sending the crowd into a dancing frenzy and setting every one up for the main acts. It was a good finale for them too, as they are now taking a break to knuckle down and finish writing and recording their debut album.

The large crowd stuck around in eager anticipation for the Last Dinosaurs. I’ve been waiting to catch these guys live ever since I first heard Honolulu on Triple J and having released their EP Back From The Dead over a year ago, the question of why these guys have never played in Adelaide before still remains unanswered. Their lack of presence probably payed off for them tonight though, because from the moment they took to the stage and launched into their set, the crowd completely went off. As Far As You’re Concerned, the heaviest track of their EP was played early on followed by some new tracks before buried deep in the set, the unmistakable rift from Honolulu sent the crowd into a frenzy of cheers, much to the band’s amusement. New single Time And Place received a welcoming reception too as did set closer Saturn, another track off their EP.

I was surprised at the energy these guys had, first impressions can be deceiving, at first glance they all look so young and innocent but they have an amazingly strong stage presence and bring so much life into their already lively tracks. They seemed really taken aback by the reception they received, with lead singer Sean Caskey declaring it was their best gig of the tour so far so hopefully they regret not coming here sooner and make a point to visit as often as possible.

By the time their set had finished, it was well past midnight and the crowd numbers began to dwindle whilst Papa Vs. Pretty set their equipment up. By the time they took to the stage, the crowd was nowhere near as sizeable as it had been during the night but it was still a substantial turn out nonetheless. Opening with Sgt. Suffer from their debut EP Heavy Harm, they set the pace and energy high early on and surprisingly managed to maintain this for the entirety of their set. Wrecking Ball and Ask Yourself provided some rhythm for the crowd to move to whilst Piper offered a nice break in pace and allowed the band to have a well-deserved break too.

My one concern before seeing these guys was about the vocal quality of singer Thomas Rawle. Rawle undoubtedly has a unique voice (think a cross between Matt Bellamy and Isaac Brock of Modest Mouse) and I was slightly worried about how his strained vocals and yowling would translate into a live performance but I needn’t have worried as every note was hit to perfection and he came off sounding even better than the recordings, something that even the most talented singers have trouble pulling off.

In between songs, Rawle talked to the crowd, mainly about their upcoming debut album, why the design on the front of their EP is that design (he actually didn’t know why), and how he’s really bad at talking in between songs. In their set they scattered a few of the tracks off of said debut album, with One Of The Animals (which has recently been added to Triple J), Honey and Conquistador giving a nice taste of what to expect from the release. By far the song that got the biggest reaction from the crowd was title track Heavy Harm, positioned towards the end of the set, the anthemic song’s swelling guitars and grand vocals elicited the biggest crowd response and a dancing frenzy instantly ensued.

Now I’ll be the first to admit that generally when 1:30am rolls around I’m pretty much in a catatonic state, no matter what night of the week it is. Tonight however, as 1:30am came and went, I was still buzzing. I couldn’t get the smile off my face from The Salvadors, couldn’t stop dancing around from the the Last Dinosaurs and I couldn’t stop singing along to Papa Vs. Pretty. Each band brought a unique element to the line-up and when placed together side-by-side, they created some sort of musical ecstasy and I’ll be hard-pressed to find someone who left without a smile on their face.