Considering that this gig was sold out, you might think a few more people would have come down early to show Northeast Party House’s support bands some love. Strangely enough, that wasn’t the case. But maybe that was because they were so different to Northeast Party House that the fans just weren’t interested.
The night began with Melbourne indie-rock outfit The Shakes who played fantastically, kicking things off in a bouncy, upbeat manner. This band would have been more in their element playing their own gig though, or even just in a smaller venue. They didn’t really seem to know how to react to people standing so far back from the stage at first (just kinda milling around and barely paying attention) but surprisingly, they worked with what they had and nailed it.
One thing though, which they lost points for with the crowd, was admitting that they stole a riff from Lily Allen near the end of their set. They attributed it to her being “a fucking hot bitch”, but not many punters seemed that impressed with the blatant rip off of her song ‘Not Fair’. (Maybe don’t tell people that, boys!) When The Shakes came to a close, Gold Field DJs stepped in and spun a couple of tunes, but there was nothing too interesting going on in the mix. It was basically just playing well known songs, with minimal remixing. You wouldn’t’ve known it was an actual DJ unless you googled the line-up.
Around the middle of the night, the room was moderately packed out and The Pretty Littles seemed very pleased about this. The Melbourne four-piece were almost too excited, but it worked. Unfortunately, the main feature from this set were the intense amounts of feedback in random places, where they played well but were not noticed. There was still a large amount of people milling around, not really paying attention at this point – but that tends to be what happens when you hire two indie-rock support bands for a pop band’s show.
Finally, it was time for the headliners Northeast Party House. A lot of the fans were very restless by this point, and the screams were almost deafening when the lights dimmed and the band stepped on stage. They were very tight and succinct as a band, but the songs blended in to one another way too much at the start, and it kinda just sounded like pop music on steroids for a bit. There was also minimal stage banter between songs, which didn’t help in terms of breaking up the set. What also didn’t help was how bored lead singer Zach Hamilton-Reeves looked every time someone played a solo. He just didn’t really seem that into his own band, which is never a good look.
All in all, this gig could have been better, but the fans seemed to not mind too much that all the songs sounded nearly like one big song. The fact that the fans weren’t into the support bands that much really set the tone for the gig at first, but when Northeast Party House played, the vibes changed instantly and from the back it looked like a massive party (house).
Towards the end of the gig though, a little bit of variation in the set list finally came through, (but only briefly) with a few shorter, snappier numbers, and then the band went off stage only to appear minutes later to take a selfie with the crowd and finish with a cover of ‘Every Morning’ by Sugar Ray.
