Jet Market, When Giants Sleep,Martha Moxley, Final Lies @The Maram, Canberra (27/10/11)

Sun 30th Oct, 2011 in Gig Reviews

Canberra music fans have a lot to answer for…but more about that later.

There were about 40 people inside The Maram when local openers Final Lies took to the stage on Thursday night – not too bad for a school night and a relatively unknown headlining act. They opened with a strong track, but it wasn’t hard to notice that their sound was a little thinner than usual, as they were playing with four, instead of with their usual five members. Vocalist Sally GIllberg later joked that that the band had kicked out one of their guitarists, but then revealed that he had actually broken his leg at their last show and was unable to play. She also explained that they were playing with a replacement drummer for the show as well – something that I hadn’t noticed until that point. Drummer Dave did an awesome job at filling in, playing tightly throughout the set of energetic pop-punk/rock songs – so much so, that unless you were really familiar with the band’s members you wouldn’t have noticed the difference.
The band also for threw in a cover of Grinspoon’s More Than You Are, which was well received by the crowd. Kudos to the band for soldiering on despite the missing band members, as most other bands would have pulled out of the gig.

Next up were newcomers Martha Moxley who have been playing a lot of shows lately and have started to gain a solid local following. The band put on a solid set of post-hardcore tunes, however the bass guitar could hardly be heard, leaving the bottom end sounding surprisingly empty (no fault of the band though).
Vocalist David Wine has a great melodic singing voice, which was a little underused as he tended to favour the screaming element to his vocal lines. The band was energetic on stage and the crowd seemed to get into it.

Next up were Jet Market from Rome, Italy. Their appearance on stage caught many off guard for a couple of reasons. The first being that they were using a drumkit belonging to locals When Giants Sleep, and the second that they were billed as headliners, so it seemed unusual they weren’t performing last.
Their website says that their motto is “Play fast, or fucking die”, which is exactly what the four-piece did. They launched into a set of blistering fast paced, no-nonsense punk which was reminiscint of a lot of the bands on Swedish punk label Burning Heart Records.
What was unique was that drummer Alex is also the lead singer. He did an excellent job of providing clean, melodic vocals, whilst keeping the fast paced tempo throughout the set. With a voice similar to Nikola Sarcevic of Millencolin and music akin to No Use For A Name the guys played tightly in what seemed to be a short set. It’s just a shame that there weren’t many people there to witness it.

Now here’s a tip for Canberra punters –show some respect and support for the musicians who are playing for you. Jet Market had travelled half way across the world to play for Australian audiences, and the crowd at the Maram (apart from the small few at the front of the stage) remained uninterested. For whatever reason, most of the crowd decided to retire to the bar area or outside balcony for the band’s set which to me was disappointing to see the lack of respect. For Jet Market, it must have been downright disheartening to play for the ten or so people that remained in the band room whilst thirty-odd acted like they couldn’t care less. Jet Market are not a bad band, so I don’t know why the audience chose to do this.

The fourth and final band of the night was local act When Giants Sleep, who delivered a tight set, full of post-hardcore tunes. All of the people who were the subject of the above rant were now back in the band room dancing in front of the stage and providing crew vocals whenever vocalist Arnie Khoundavong held the mic out into the crowd.
This was the first time that I had seen the band in action and Khoundavong was an excellent front man – transitioning effortlessly between melodic and screamed vocals, whilst jumping around onstage. All of the other band members filled their roles in what was a well received set – so much so that the crowd demanded an encore which of course was granted by the band.