Whilst being a headlining band from the successful and recently finished Groovin’ The Moo festival, Friday night saw Canadians City And Colour grace the stage respectively at Adelaide’s Thebarton Theatre for their sold out show. I arrived on my own to catch fellow Canadian muso Bahamas, who warmed and welcomed the crowd with his opening support set. I then managed to detour my way around any smug couples and snuggled into a seat upstairs that was centre to the stage, where I overlooked an entire room full of Adelaideans; that was actually really nice in itself.

This was my first time seeing Dallas Green along with City And Colour, but I had always heard wonderful things so I knew I was in for something special… And it was. The audience clapped and cheered as the band walked on to the stage, and as soon as Dallas started singing, I immediately felt transfixed on him. They opened with “We Found Each Other In The Dark” and I sunk back into my chair to let the incredible fusion of blues, country and folk wash over me.

The light show is worth mentioning as it complimented the band’s sound entirely and didn’t overshadow them at all. I think the simple effect of having lights express certain dynamics of songs was just a simple viewing pleasure I enjoyed to see with a band like City Any Colour.

The 5-piece band are all exceptionally talented musicians in their own right, and they performed together as a collective quite naturally. There was nobody fighting to stand out and I particularly liked the fact that Dallas stood and played to the far left (or stage right) of the stage; not necessarily making an effort to scream out, “I’m the front man, look at me!” With saying that, he is definitely a very modest, polite and engaging person.

A highlight was when the rest of the band took a break and Dallas Green took the stage on his own to serenade the audience to tunes like “Day Old Hate”, “Body In A Box” and “What Makes A Man”. I swear this man is too gifted for this world, because his angelic voice almost gave me head spins.

My personal standout moment was when the band returned on stage for a beautiful performance of my favourite City And Colour song, “The Girl”. I swoooooned!

I must say, I was pretty bloody impressed with the audience at City And Colour; especially cause I’ve seen Adelaide cop a lot of flack in this department! There was such a sense of ‘family’, togetherness and warmth in the room, and I believe that The Thebby was the perfect venue to hold such an intimate show. I could just sense from the crowd that everybody was head over heels for the band, and if they weren’t hanging on the edge of their seats then they were on the edge of their toes! It was actually heart-warming to notice people quietly singing along to themselves and clapping along gently.

After walking off stage and returning for an encore, Dallas Green thanks them all once again. He then goes on to mention how Adelaide holds a special place in his heart as it was the first city in Australia he ever played music in. I’m sure everybody shared a fuzzy feeling after hearing this, and he then went into an acoustic performance of “Comin’ Home”. Finally, he was joined by the rest of the band as they played and finished the show with “Hope For Now”.

I honestly recommend if you aren’t familiar with City And Colour that you get your head and ears into their music. There is so much depth and talent within this band that deserves to be appreciated.

I was very happy to be a part of a glowing Adelaide audience last Friday night.