People who complain about the lack of gigs in Perth should be shot. Tonight we’ve got Pearl Jam playing at Subiaco Oval, Augie March, Sarah Blasko and others at Escape to the Park and The Datsuns launching new album Smoke and Mirrors here at the Amplifier Bar.

Crowds at the band’s previous Perth gigs have been peppered with casual listeners and curious first timers. But the choice of gigs tonight has certainly separated the sheep from the goats. While the awesome foursome may have played larger stages here in the past, tonight’s performance was to a crowd bursting with enthusiasm.

Adelaide’s Swayback, the first band on tonight’s bill, put on a lively show but with little response from the sparse 8.30 crowd, their set hardly gathers pace. Their sound is a fair bit cleaner than the dirty rock of tonight’s headliners and though the band put in a good effort, the early punters seem more interested in the kind of entertainment that comes in pint glasses.

While Swayback have to compete with beer for the crowd’s attention, The Volcanics are the exact opposite. The ‘canics are faster and, er, louder than their South Australian compatriots and the four-piece’s tunes sit nicely next to a pint of Beck’s as the night picks up. The band are still on something of a comeback trail after a break from the live scene. The Volcanics of old were a band that relied on booze to fill the gaps in their ramshackle performances – but tonight they are much tighter as a unit and each member’s musicianship stands head and shoulders above what they showed on 2004’s Nothin’ for You and 2005’s Light the Fuse. The band’s set still draws heavily on that material, but when comparing their sound tonight to their EPs there is no contest.

The Datsuns may have got more than they bargained for with The Volcanics, as they certainly have a hard act to follow. Opening with Who Are You Stamping Your Foot for? and Such a Pretty Curse from Smoke and Mirrors, it’s obvious that tonight’s set will be heavy on material from the new release. But is that what the crowd wants? The answer is pretty clear when the kiwi four-piece start raiding their back catalogue – Sittin’ Pretty gets the show into gear before Motherfucker From Hell lifts the roof off the venue.

Hanging out with John Paul Jones from Led Zeppelin is something that has obviously influenced the band, with guitarists Phil Buscke and Christian Livingstone exorcising Page-like riffs with the hair to boot. Frontman Dolf de Datsun commands the crowd whenever he opens his mouth but unlike so many other bands, the singer and bass guitarist seems happy to step back and let his bandmates have their moment in the spotlight.

Though their live sound is impressive and their imposing stage presence makes them hard to ignore, the amount of Smoke and Mirrors material holds the set back, with almost every track on the album getting an airing. Blood Red and Maximum Heartbreak stand out above the other new tracks and the crowd laps it all up regardless.

In the latter stages of the performance it’s the same I-like-your-old-stuff-better-than-your-new-stuff story. Every track from the band’s 2002 debut LP creates a frenzy in the sweaty crowd, taking us back to the time when ‘The’ bands were in vogue and ‘Antipodean’ was used so we could claim New Zealand’s best as our own.

There’s In Love, Harmonic Generator, Fink for the Man and Lady, which all remind us that sometimes in life it’s necessary to turn it up to 11. Tucked in there too is a slick cover of the Ramones’ The KKK Took My Baby Away but they needn’t have bothered – the amount of old favourites at the end of tonight’s set has done enough to hit the spot just nicely.