Vampire
Weekend
Gang of
Youths
Festival
Hall, West Melbourne
Monday 6
January 2014
$88.74
The Vampire Chronicles
Most parents avidly track the various ‘firsts’ of
their offspring; first steps, first word, first Christmas, first day of school,
first day of high school, first pimple, first drunken experience etc.
My wife Angela and I were conscious of this when for
Christmas in 2013 Santa decided to bestow a ticket for Vampire Weekend on our
eldest son, Oscar, who was 14 at the time. Should Julia ever pose the big
question to him, we hope Vampire Weekend will still have some cachet. The good
news is that I also received a ticket from Santa!
Vampire Weekend, along with Gorillaz, is one of the
few bands our entire family quite likes. Their latest album, Modern Vampires of the City, has been on
heavy rotation in the car. We love their infectious, upbeat songs and we sing
along loudly, notwithstanding that the lyrics are obtuse and make very little
sense. Which is great because it doesn’t matter so much when you get them wrong
– which we frequently do.
They remind me of early Talking Heads with their
quirky song structures and staccato rhythms, with a trace of Paul Simon circa Graceland. They even have a song about
architecture (Mansard Roof).
Going to your first gig at Festival Hall was a rite of
passage for people of my generation and earlier, not because it was an
impressive building or boasted superior acoustics. Quite the opposite on both
counts – architecturally it is what is known in the industry as a shit-hole and
acoustically it is a shit-box. However, for many years it was the only rock
venue in Melbourne that wasn’t a pub, so if you were under 18, or under the age
when you could pass for 18, that was the only place you could go to see bands.
I remember going to a Battle of the Bands contest there in the late 1970s only
because The Sports were paying at the end of the competition. It was the only
way I could see them.
In the way that one generation likes to pass on
traditions and rituals to the next generation, especially unpleasant ones, it was
only fitting that Oscar’s first gig be at Festival Hall.
We had General Admission floor tickets (non-licensed
area) so that Oscar could get a real sense of the buzz that you can get from
being in the crowd at a good gig. Also, because the seated areas on the side at
Festival Hall are among the worst vantage points you can get for comfort, sightlines
or sound anywhere in the world.
The back row at Wembley would be better.
Oscar picked up a tour t-shirt and we stood back a
bit from the throng, but still close enough to get a god view. While we waited
for the band to come on I began to get a sense of how young the crowd was. This
shouldn’t have surprised me given I was with a 14 year old, but even so, I
wasn’t ready for the teeny-bopper squealing that erupted every time one of the
band members wandered on stage to plug something in or move a mike stand. The
band must have been lapping it up, because I couldn’t work out why the roadies
weren’t performing these perfunctory tasks.
I looked around and noticed that I was comfortably
the oldest person in the area by a good 20 years or so. Feeling somewhat
conspicuous I made a point of keeping up the conversation with Oscar so that I
looked less like a paedophile and more like a father accompanying his son to a
gig.
When the band emerged on stage together to start the
show the screaming reached a deafening pitch. I concede that lead singer and
rhythm guitarist Ezra Koenig is a handsome man, notwithstanding the khaki
onesie he was wearing. It was like a boiler suit. Had it been yellow I would
have sworn I was seeing Devo. Bass player Chris Baio is okay looking I suppose,
drummer Rostam Batmanglij is tall and beardy, and at least has ‘Batman…’ as
part of his name, but guitarist Chris Thomson could possibly be cast as a
hobbit in a Lord of the Rings movie. I don’t mean that unkindly – he was in my
view the star of the show – it’s just that I didn’t quite understand the
teeny-bopper squealing that accompanied their every gesture.
One of the good things about an audience made up
predominantly of young girls, however, is that I can actually see without too
much difficulty. That’s not the only good thing, but it’s the one I’m prepared
to admit to. Most of the bands I see seem to appeal exclusively to tall males,
so it was a relief to not have long-necked oafs in front of me.
The band launched into the quirky, up-tempo Diane Young from their latest album,
followed by the Paul Simonesque, White
Sky from Contra, then Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa from their first
LP. They picked up the pace again with Unbelievers
and Holiday and got the audience
bouncing and singing along enthusiastically.
Even slower numbers like Step, got everyone singing, particularly three young girls just to
our right who stood facing each other rather than the stage and sang the words
loudly at one another. They also managed to carve out their own dancing space with
their exaggerated moves, but no one begrudged them. Vampire Weekend was very
much their band and they were having the time of their lives, utterly oblivious
to the other 5,000 people present.
The band maintained a frenetic pace and energy and
worked their way through a good mix of songs from their three albums. There
really were no dull moments - Oscar’s favourite songs Horchata and A-Punk all
came in the first half of the show, but they also got around to playing two of
my favourites, Oxford Comma and Cousins.
Most eyes remained on Koenig and he is a magnetic
frontman, but guitarist Chris Tomson was the real revelation for me – he
reminded me of Joey Santiago from Pixies in that he was happy to stay more or
less in the background, but his musicality and virtuosity provided much of the
colour and momentum of the show.
The set ended with Giving Up the Gun and the relatively slow and reflective, but
fabulously catchy, The Obvious Bicycle.
By this time they could have played anything and the audience would have roared
along.
They had the confidence to commence the encore with
another gentle number, Hannah Hunt,
before busting out a couple of infectious showstoppers, One (Blake’s Got a New Face) and Walcott. As we escaped Festival Hall Oscar and I, like everyone
else, left the hall singing a lyric about escaping Cape Cod. As first gigs go
Oscar had seen a beauty.
Diane Young
White Sky
Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa
Unbelievers
Holiday
Step
Finger Back
Horchata
Everlasting Arms
Cousins
California English
A-Punk
Boston (Ladies of Cambridge)
Ya Hey
Campus
Oxford Comma
Giving Up the Gun
Obvious Bicycle
- - - - - - - - -
Hannah Hunt
One (Blake's Got a New Face)
Walcott
Encore –
Festival hall figures prominently in Melbourne’s musical history. It was where
The Beatles played in 1964, just three days after I was born. Most big acts of
the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s have played there: Bob Dylan, Lou Reed, Queen, The
Clash, you name it. I was taken there as a child by my parents to see Andy
Stewart, a kilt wearing Scottish singer. My eldest brother David took me to see
Leo Sayer ‘s Just a Boy tour. One
early gig I went to featured The Angels, Cold Chisel, Flowers (Icehouse), The
Boys Next Door and La Femme. The Boys Next Door were heartily booed throughout
their set by Chisels fans, which of course simply encouraged Nick Cave to up
the barking and hee-haws.
Despite my misgivings about the acoustics and the
sightlines, I’ve been back numerous times to see loads of bands; Elvis
Costello, The Police, Fleetwood Mac, Madness, REM, Ian Dury and The Blockheads,
PJ Harvey, Morrissey, Radiohead, Pulp, Pixies, Iggy Pop, The Strokes, The Sex
Pistols, The Motels, Coldplay, The The, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, and now
Vampire Weekend, among others. And I’ll probably keep returning so long as the
bands keep playing there.
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