Fleet Foxes@ Opera House,Sydney (02/01/2012)

Fri 6th Jan, 2012 in Gig Reviews

I expected an aural back rub from some beardies in plaid shirts. Not this. This is loud. Really loud. Seat rattling, rib rumbling, floor shaking LOUD! I expected something easy and soothing. Folksy pop to complement the smell of pine and a campfire’s merry crackle. This?! This is the sound of a match and a whole bloody forest going up in flames.

Fleet Foxes’ performance at Sydney’s Opera House may spoil the band’s recorded output. It’s like the albums are a childish squeak and live they’ve hit puberty; blustering around the stage full of testosterone and teenage bravado.

It’s not simply a case of turning up the volume. Everything feels bigger and wider. Those harmonies are huge. They stride off the stage, filling every crevice – stalking the audience, hunting snoozing half-wits whose lapels are in need of a darn good shake. Joshua Tillman and Christian Wargo don’t merely add breadth to Robin Pecknold’s (very fine) vocal lead; they mount a three-pronged attack. Starting with the golden tones of The Plains/Bitter Dance, voices curl and bind together, creating an intensity that borders on the threatening.

The performance is charged with something not readily accessible on record. It’s not quite anger. Not malevolence, but an unsettling energy that suggests things just might boil over. A violin is scratchy and irritable. There’s a heated tussle between traditional and contemporary instruments. Robin Pecknold loses the reverb that gives his voice a choral purity. It’s as if there’s a suspicion people have been relegating them to the background, engaging with Fleet Foxes as a pleasant diversion. Tonight is their opportunity to rough the audience up a bit. Forcefully fill our ears with every drop of eye-popping beauty they have to offer.

Despite the gutsiness, none of the dramatic subtleties have been sacrificed. It’s not a rawk version of Fleet Foxes; the music just feels untethered and a bit wild. Freed from the constraints of a studio it can buck and kick against the notion the band is an easy listening option when things need to be relaxed or hushed. Sim Sala Bim is still gorgeous, but the drums thundering through the mid-section makes this slice of pastoral loveliness feel like a giant teddy bear punching you in the face. When the vocal round gathers pace, spooling layer upon layer of finely wrought harmony, White Winter Hymnal is a joy to revel in – still, the chilling image of “white snow, red as strawberries in the summertime” is hard and present in Pecknold’s clear enunciation.

So absorbing is the performance there’s a sense the Opera House is a willing cohort. She can be a bit temperamental. A number of artists, thrilled to be playing in her hallowed space, have been chewed up. The sound dries up somewhere around the 10th row. Treble or bass notes evaporate. The back of the hall winds up neglected and unloved. Not tonight. The Opera House treats Fleet Foxes’ offerings like a newborn. Delivering each note with care, ensuring every nuance is received unhindered.

If it all sounds a bit furrow browed and humourless, it’s not. The group are nicely genial. Mid song banter is easy and quick. Humble thanks are offered sincerely. They’re perfectly ordinary folk who give a massive stuff about how their art is heard. Detail matters. A sax is dragged around purely so Morgan Henderson can ensure textural context is provided by 47 seconds of atonal squall during The Shrine/An Argument. When Pecknold fiddles around with his guitar for the umpteenth time the drive for perfection is both charming and slightly ‘oh-just-get-on-with-it’.

If there’s a case for ditching the predictable encore, the departure after Grown Ocean is it. The finish, almost evangelical in the way the melody billows out across the room, is perfect. People are on their feet, fingers crossed Fleet Foxes have the good sense to leave now while everyone is brimming with euphoria and gladness. Of course they return and when Pecknold stands solo to deliver a soft strummed number about giving his lady the elbow the audience’s enthusiasm slumps quicker than a European economy.

No matter, the four-song return includes the beguiling Blue Ridge Mountains and closes with the heartfelt paean to a simpler life, Helplessness Blues. Everyone is on their feet again, euphoria and gladness restored – along with a small worry that the studio versions may never live up to tonight.