Darwin Deez @ The Bakery,Perth (12/05/11)

Sun 15th May, 2011 in Gig Reviews

Oddball New York Quartet Darwin Deez are a small band with a big live show, they know how to have fun and deliver as much entertainment as they can fit onto the tiny stage they perform on. Their songs are almost lazy in their simplicity – the front man Darwin Smith sings with a casual style that suggests teenage parties and warm summer nights – but they manage to deliver it all with so much charisma that even the most jaded listener can’t help but smile.

Supporting the main event were three boys from Mandurah in the guise of Sneaky Weasel Gang. They delivered a very polished sound, with a quasi-psychedelic retro style akin to The Black Keys, Led Zeppelin and Tame Impala. They never missed a beat and filled the stage with sound using just guitar, bass and drums, displaying some especially competent solos via Dan Caroll’s guitar/wah pedal combo.

However, the band as a whole brought little innovation to the table, opting for a standard rock band format with hardly any moments in their music that distinguished them from the greats that have come before. It was strictly a band for fans of the genre and as such, ended up dividing the ‘Deez crowd into watchers and loiterers.

To kick off the main event, a man resembling Patrick Stewart got on stage and begun passionately monologuing about gurus and their many fields of expertise, as well as referring the audience to a website: guru.com (which turned out to be a freelance employment site, unrelated to gurus). Finally, he called out the greatest Guru of them all: Darwin Deez.

The band dramatically walked on in the dark and begun choreographed head-banging to 80s metal before abruptly jumping into the cute, mellow Up in the Clouds from their only album to date. Smith himself looked as bizarre in real life as in his videos and singing with just as much careless panache, his band following suit with the second guitarist wearing an 80’s pastel sweater and a koala hat.

They played Suicide Song and got the crowd to sing and dance to what was, according to Smith, ‘the best song [he’s] ever written’: DNA. After a few songs it became clear that there was a recurring theme of loss and desolation in the music that, on a first listen, seems innocent and naive. Their catchy hooks and boppy melodies had the strange effect of getting people dancing and clapping their hands on the dance floor while the man on stage poured his heart out with deeply touching lyrics and the voice of a child.

The band took things to another level between tracks when they did some fantastic choreography as a take on high school dance performances, mixing Barry White, Miike Snow, Spice Girls and Willow Smith, warping or remixing them to dance to. Especially funny moments coming where Enya’s Sail Away was juxtaposed with Rage Against the Machine’s Testify.

At times they even rapped, with Darwin himself throwing out insults at Jay-Z, making some sick potty humour rhymes and looking very white and nerdy in a ‘so bad it’s good’ kind of way. Generally, their audience interaction was at a level many bigger artists don’t come close to reaching.

To finish on a positive note, they saved the happiest for last, ending the set with_ Radar Detector_ and getting everyone jumping wildly and singing along for a huge finish – though their encore was the less-than-catchy Constellations.

Ultimately, their off-kilter antics were fun, engaging and ensured everyone had the time of their lives, nobody could help grooving along to their bittersweet take on indie-pop, making it an extremely positive night. They were definitely worth the price of admission.