It’s Thursday night and I’m down at The Grace to cover one of Adelaide’s more successful productions over the past few years, Leader Cheetah. The band, going acoustic for the first time tonight, managed to sell out the venue in pre-sale tickets alone – a great sign for what was to come. People filled the venue nicely, which isn’t exactly hard, considering the ‘cosy’ size of the spot, so it wasn’t long before people were angling for a comfortable spot.

Opening the show tonight was an acoustic performance by J-Wah. A member of The Beards, I was used to seeing him flanked by his fellow bearded band mates, doing the comical rock-star bit. Tonight though, he was performing in a different light and was definitely interesting to watch. Although he performed to only a few people, J-Wah seemed to just enjoy jamming out and providing a decent soundtrack to everybody’s conversations/drinking bout. The Grace has always provided a great atmosphere for musicians to play without the pressures of performing to a pretentious sort of crowd, so there was no feeling of awkwardness to watch J-Wah perform, knowing that he may not have had the attention of the majority of the crowd the entirety of the set.

The venue had filled up quite well by the time Leader Cheetah had quickly tested instruments and were ready to go. When I’d interviewed Leader Cheetah’s Dan Crannitch only yesterday, he told me that they’d be re-jigging their usual set up to accommodate violinist Tom Spall, in lieu of guitarist Dan Pash. As it turns out, Spall’s work throughout the set worked really well with the intimate nature of the show. As Crannitch opened the set solo, simply accompanied by his acoustic guitar, his band mates subtly took up their spots on the teeny stage and eased seamlessly into their stripped back set. Trying to get photos to accompany this piece proved near-on impossible, due to the amount of people crammed in to get a piece of the action, so I hung back near the bar to get a better sound.

While Leader Cheetah hadn’t performed an acoustic set like this previously, you wouldn’t think it to watch them perform tonight. Performing songs from their two albums, The Sunspot Letters and Lotus Skies, the four-piece delivered their material wholeheartedly as if they were on one of the bigger stages they’ve graced over the year. The only thing letting them down was the clashing in vocal/guitar audio – there were many points during the set where Crannitch’s vocals were drowned out by the instruments, making it hard for those of us back where I was to pinpoint the exact songs being played.

“Dianne”, “Lotus Skies” and “Bloodlines” were the main highlights for me, though the entire set was easy to just sit back and listen to and enjoy. Addressing the fact that many people liken the band’s sound to that of folk rock legend Neil Young, Leader Cheetah finally responded tonight with a strong cover of “Cortez The Killer”, a performance which went down extremely well. With Crannitch’s unmistakeable vocals, his brother Joel’s stripped back pace on the drums and of course, the addition of Spall’s violin, there was that slow-burning alt-country feel to the delivery which was awesome to see in tonight’s setting.

As, what is most likely, their last show for the year, Leader Cheetah can put this gig up there on their list of ridiculously successful shows of 2011. Having both seen them perform in larger venues through the year and read reviews of their festival appearances, I’d safely be able to say that the band has definitely left an impact on audiences country wide as this year comes to a close – what better way to celebrate than with an intimate, sold out show in their hometown.