What the HiFi bar lacks in liquid sustenance (no energy drinks) it makes up for in a capacity-packed crowd and great music. This suited me to a tee when I saw Sparta there on a cold Friday night in Melbourne-town. The arrival of Sparta was sounded by their own entrance music as Jim Ward , Matt Miller, Tony Hajjar and Keeley Davis took to the stage, getting to straight to work. No announcement and no fuss – just letting the music guide them and speak to the crowd.

Early on in the show, drummer Tony Hajjar was hitting the skins so hard he lost the screw top off a cymbal. Just watching Tony in his own right – drumming fiercely hard – was impressive enough in itself. Drummers are drummers – dudes at the back of the room. But then, I would say this highlighted one of the differences between Sparta and other bands.

Sparta are a stand-out band. Their songs are great and their sound is high energy with fast delivery. Their show consisted of a well-thought out mixture of the old and the new; ‘Light Burns Clear’, ‘Unstitch Your Mouth’, ‘Cut Your Ribbon’ (their encore song), ‘Untreatable Disease’, ‘Taking Back Control’; a few of the favourites that were mixed up in their two-hour show. Each song proved, without doubt, that Sparta could only go from strength to strength with their fans as they rocked out and slowly introduced the occasional softer song.

Sparta stirred up the crowd with teasing chords between songs as they re-tuned their guitars. It was quite impressive to watch them – almost-jam – before launching into a new song with the crowd getting behind them even more. Every song or start of chord seemed to be greeted with a familiar cheer of excitement that Sparta were playing some fan’s favourite Sparta song.

Song favourites, like ‘Unstich Your Mouth’ and ‘Taking Back Control’, not only proved popular for Sparta, but seemed to showcase Jim Ward’s vocal abilities as he channelled (at least for me) the vocals of Bono from U2 (in his hey-day of brilliance). Their anthem songs, designed to reach the masses, did just that and moved the crowd to dance, bop, and play a bit of air guitar. One punter, with eyes glazed over, even saw fit to grace the stage with her hand bag swinging presence before graciously collapsing over a security guy as he escorted her back off stage. That’s rock and roll for ya baby!

Sparta proved to be a highly appreciative band equipped with energy which was visible the entire time they owned the stage. Their heart went into every song they pumped out as they gave all they could to the HiFi Bar crowd who lapped it all up and waited for more, and more. Sparta never diminished on stage vocally – energy-wise or musically. Their fun, hardcore sound bounced off the crowd who soaked in every high end guitar riff, crushing drumbeat, smile and look that the Sparta boys threw out to them.

It was a great gig full of fantastic music.