The Devoted Few + PaperScissors @ Rebel Rebel(29/07/06)

Mon 31st Jul, 2006 in Gig Reviews

A Saturday night in Sydney and there is almost a springtime feeling in the air. Parties are sprouting up everywhere.

Boundary Sounds clicked their heels and organised a party at Home’s Rebel Rebel with all the ingredients of a good warehouse party, some up and coming bands and DJs. The crowd filtered in and found their way into the low lit enclaves around the dance floor as The Hollys mixed up the tunes on the decks and warmed the night, and when The Paper Scissors hit the main stage, a few hit the dance floor while the rest of the crowd hung to the shadows. With their clip ‘We Don’t Walk’ on Rage the previous evening, The Paper Scissors were enthusiastic and full of energy cutting through the Saturday night chatter of the crowd. As lead singer Jai Pyne sang “You’re getting tired” the crowd is ready for some more movement. An electro bass line bounces along as Pyne gets on the keys and the crowd jostle before a baritone sax adds some soul to the savvy set.With the truss of intelligent lights behind the bands, the focus is down on the dance floor and not on the band, this venue is made for dancing as the macs whiz through your sight line blinding you to the norm and jolting the muscles into spasms of dance. The smoke machine pumps clouds of fake atmosphere through the night of lights.

The Devoted Few enter the main stage and the crowd is humming with the excitement of seeing these guys in their first headline off the back of a tour with Eskimo Joe. They launch into ‘Desolation Angels’ and the dance floor is spacious but moving. Ben Fletcher is the consummate front man as he takes the band through a dense sounding set. It is the volume of the PA and the conglomeration of the sometimes three guitars, keys and bass that hammer up the intensity of the tunes. ‘Cry Your Eyes Out’ is the stand out in a night of material that deserves more intention.

As they pack down the main stage, the venue opens up to its intention – to get everyone on the dancefloor, and the DJs take control. The crowd goes through a transition where those there for live music leave to find other digs for a Saturday evening, and a crowd of party people just looking for something with a beat to dance to, take over.

Upstairs, in the small glass bow of the Home music mothership Moscow Schoolboy continue the live action. It is a small room overlooking the twinkling tourist waters of Darling Harbour, yet the music craves the dark and dirty small pub feel of their Melbourne homelands to really fill the mood. Moscow Schoolboy has the art school bluesy rock sensibilities of Boss Hogg, and you would be sure to find them in fine form with the polish of a dirtier atmosphere. Lead girl Jess’s red shoes click three times and she already finds herself at Home.

The crowd has undergone an almost complete changeover and finding fellow music lovers is like trying to find a taxi at 3am. If its got a backbeat you can use it, and so it becomes a chance to try on stylised dance moves that have been practised in front of the mirror with a thousand time pout. Both upstairs and downstairs the dancers take over, and into the shadows of the city we merge into the darkness before The Model School have a chance to play. Mi spiace.