Live Reviews

Over the years, The Wombats really held it down for Britpop at a time when Bloc Party was middling around and Arctic Monkeys were a bit too big for the little guy anymore. The combination of excellent songwriting, earwormy hooks and vibrant, upbeat dance rock really hit home for a lot of people, and songs…

Is post-Covid a genre? Dry Cleaning are one of the more curious acts to build a fanbase during the lockdown era, but having taken advantage of the lack of touring opportunities by releasing two albums across an 18-month period, they arrive with a more solid catalogue than many newer bands. On their first Australian tour…

It’s been a while since bands have been able to tour, so it’s good to see some of the favourites such as RÜFÜS DU SOL back on our shores. After the release of Surrender in October 2021, fans have been waiting some time to see the trio perform. As the sun set on a warm…

Over the same weekend that West Coast legend DJ Quik was set to play a small Sydney gig in the cramped side room of Metro Theatre, fellow Compton emcee Kendrick Lamar performed two tightly-packed shows at the staggeringly large Qudos Bank Arena as part of his global The Big Steppers tour. Two enormous symbols of…

What a band. What a gig. What a venue. Local boys Rufus Du Sol just packed out The Domain twice as if it was Field Day in 2007, presenting one of the rare times in Sydney a festival atmosphere had been purpose-built primarily with one act in mind. Yes, there were two support acts and…

Sunday night was the return of beloved English band The Wombats to Melbourne for the second time in 2022. With the earlier tour focusing on the release of their 2022 album, Fix Yourself, Not the World, this tour off the back of Spilt Milk Festival was to celebrate their recently released EP, Is This What…

Local heavy juggernauts Deadlights and Mirrors crushed the final show of their six-date co-headline tour last night at Princess Theatre in Brisbane, celebrating their respective 2021 albums The Uncanny Valley and The Ego’s Weight. Supported by Inertia, Deadnerve and Sunbleached, the stacked lineup brought their all and treated fans to a night to remember. This…

The crowd was well rugged up for the inaugural Harvest Rock festival in the Adelaide parklands. Billed as a food and wine experience, there was something for everyone, from ample food trucks to wine selections from McLaren Vale to high-end dining experiences. Two intimate lunches were available from Jake Kellie of arkhé with wine and…

Ziggy Alberts played his first show in Western Australia in three-and-a-half years as he headlined Saturday’s Here Comes The Sun festival in Margaret River, also featuring The Dreggs, DZ Deathrays and Winston Surfshirt. Despite the festival’s name, the sun was only peeping through the clouds with an ominous persistent threat of rain (which occurred during…

While the weather was cold outside, it was a night of warmth and music at Margaret Court arena, as it hosted Colorado heavyweights, The Lumineers. Hollow Coves were a great opening act for The Lumineers. The duo from Brisbane put on a fantastic set and allowed the atmosphere to rise throughout their performance as the…

Throughout her growing music career, Vera Blue has become an Australian modern pop icon, and her most recent album, Mercurial is a testament to her ability to create exciting and memorable pop music. Her Saturday night Forum Theatre show displayed how well her new album translates to the live stage and reminded Melbourne what a…

As part of Park Sounds, musicians T. Lopea & the International Men of Mystique played at the Music Box (a pop-up stage near the P1 parking at Olympic Park, closest to Qudos Bank Arena) to add to the atmosphere as patrons started shuffling in for the main event, Kings of Leon supported by The Temper…

Austin City Limits closed out its second weekend Sunday with a lineup led by spectacular performers, with the overwhelming majority being women-led bands. As day three wound down, we saw some of our favorite performances of the weekend. The biggest name on Sunday was rock legend’s Red Hot Chili Peppers. It has been 10 years…

Day 2 of Austin City Limits wasn’t any cooler in temps than Day 1 but it also didn’t rock any less either. The lineup had some of the biggest names of the weekend and the crowd spanned all ages, as there was something for everyone and all styles. At the top of the bill was…

Through the nineties and early 2000s, rock and rolls influence had a resurgence through many of the big bands we listen to today. The Darkness were one of the bands to take that influence and make it there own. Their 2003 debut album, Permission to Land epitomised this and ever since, the band has been…

Austin City Limits came in hot to start weekend two as temperatures rose and the sun glared down on a crowd of over 75,000 thrilled music fans. The day was an incredible mix of global stars, up and comers and headliners new and old. It was an incredible showing for Australia as both Genesis Owusu…

When Brisbane hard rock legends The Butterfly Effect dropped IV – their first album in 14 years – last month, the return was more than welcomed by fans. The band are taking the record around the country on an 11-date national tour with Thornhill and Caligula’s Horse, which included Eatons Hill Hotel in North Brisbane…

UK rap star AJ Tracey left fans buzzing after a sold-out show at The Triffid in Brisbane on Tuesday, supported by the local Day1. It was the final date of his rescheduled Australia tour after performing in Sydney and Melbourne last week. Opening the night was Brisbane rapper Day1, who appeared wearing sunglasses and a…

Hilltop Hoods finished their successful Australian The Show Business Tour in hometown Adelaide at a sold-out Entertainment Centre on Saturday night. The mood was one of excitement and anticipation. After DJ Total Eclipse warmed up the crowd as they filled the arena, followed by singer Elsy Wameyo. With her five-piece backing band she had a…

The Dreggs are story-tellers in every sense, and there’s no better platform to share your intimate, personal tales than a sold-out gig with an adoring crowd. That was the case on Friday night at Freo.Social. The Sunshine Coast duo rounded out their ‘Hold Me Closer’ tour with two dates in the WA harbour town, the…

While many would have been cozy at home on a cold Tuesday night in August, the Forum hosted a packed house for the first of Spacey Jane’s five shows in Melbourne on their Here Comes Everybody tour. Even though this opening show was for an underage crowd, Spacey Jane, I Am Leopard and Teenage Dads…

It’s really not fair that Sigur Ros lives over there, and not over here. The iconic Icelandic band is still one of the most unique live acts in the world, regularly spurring these incredible live performances that are forever stamped all across YouTube above an invariably adoring comment section built with praise like “life-changing” and…

Gold Coast indie-pop superstar Amy Shark proved that she is one of the best entertainers of our time at The Events Centre in Caloundra last night. The sold-out show was the first of the Queensland leg of her massive 60-date regional See U Somewhere Australia tour, supported by Cult Romance. Patrons steadily filed into the…

In what became some of the hottest tickets of the year, the first of two concerts celebrating the 25th anniversary of South Park was held tonight just outside of Denver, Colorado, at the iconic Red Rocks Amphitheatre. The shows are being filmed to air later this week on US network Comedy Central, the home of…

With a title as diverse as “The Bait Fridge x Slowmango” (The hero’s journey of the Appendix), there should have been plenty of warning that this was to be no ordinary show. The procedural steps listed the “Wild West Waiting Room” as step one. Banjo players sitting around campfires, white coated cowboys pushing tumbleweeds and…

Tyler, the Creator has grown immensely as a performer and is not only capable of commanding an entire arena with just a – highly polished – stage design, a microphone and a ridiculous amount of energy. In 2022, the 31-year-old musician adds something to the confidence he’s so clearly expressed since he first stomped onto…

Frontman Julian Casablancas doesn’t seem very happy these days, letting loose with some incoherent quips occasionally while his band, New York’s legendary The Strokes, play through a greatest hits set list for the first of two Sydney shows – sideshows, may I add, to the deflating Splendour in the Grass, which this year was marred…

It’s crazy sometimes to see how few people seem to share your interest in your favourite smaller artists, especially when you can’t get over just how brilliant they are. This is exactly how I feel about JPEGMAFIA, a.k.a Peggy. As one of my favourite artists, I can never seem to get enough of his music….

The sun was out and the ground had dried up a little for Day Three of Splendour in the Grass. Weekend campers knew what they were in for and there mustn’t be a single store in Byron with gumboots left by now. Scottish rockers The Snuts brought newfound energy to the small but active crowd…

Saturday night saw the beginning of Ball Park Music’s closing weekend for their scintillating Weirder and Weirder album tour, which we recently named the best albunm of the year (so far). After almost six weeks of dates, it came to a close in the best of ways, with two shows at the Forum Theatre in…