Two cracking shows and one enormous surprise from the Killers
The Killers
Qudos Bank Arena
December 6, Rebel Diamonds ★★★★
December 7, Hot Fuss ★★★★½
Reviewed by GEORGE PALATHINGAL
Two. Stunning. Shows.
You’d think the first would be the one to tell the grandkids about: the Killers, Las Vegas’ finest, blazing through a curated set of their many pop-rock hits, plus a spine-tingling cover of one of the greatest Australian songs of all time (Don’t Change by INXS).
But then, on the second night, four shadows are thrown up on the enormous white sheet in front of the stage. It drops to reveal the original Killers line-up, who launch into their hit 2004 debut album, Hot Fuss.
The irrepressible Brandon Flowers, with original members Dave Keuning (left) and Mark Stoermer (right) making a rare overseas appearance. Credit: Chris Phelps
This is a big deal. Founding guitarist Dave Keuning and bassist Mark Stoermer don’t tour much any more; they’re presumably happy to stay at home and count their Mr Brightside royalty millions while irrepressible frontman Brandon Flowers and drummer Ronnie Vannucci Jr take the mission to the masses overseas.
For the past few tours, the loveable and excellent Theodore Sablay and Jake Blanton have filled in for Keuning and Stoermer. And, sure enough, there are the touring musicians in an augmented line-up of nine on night one, ripping through the legit crowd-pleasers and riding the occasional low where lasers, streamers and Flowers distract you from the lesser tunes, as they did in 2022.
But night two starts with only the original four, two of whom some of us didn’t even know were in the country, and it genuinely gives a special extra thrill. Stoermer quickly seizes his bass spotlight on opener Jenny Was a Friend of Mine before Keuning’s jubilant riff kicks off the third version of Mr Brightside we hear in two days. (On night one they also do that cheeky fake-out of playing a goofy dance version first.)
Drummer Ronnie Vannucci Jr played at both shows in Sydney.Credit: Chris Phelps
It’s no secret Hot Fuss is one of the most front-loaded albums you’ll ever hear – I said at the time its first five songs would one day lead the Killers’ greatest hits album and was proved 80 per cent correct.
But even after that extraordinary opening salvo, culminating with the often Elvis-channelling Flowers tagging All These Things That I’ve Done with a glorious blast of Presley’s Burning Love, the second half of the album sounds fantastic, too. Flowers punctuates the run-through with stories from the band’s early days, and it is adorable.
By now, it’s a total love-in – Sablay and Blanton join in for this exuberant celebration of Glamorous Indie Rock & Roll, as the song puts it, as do the touring line-up’s three powerhouse female backing singers – but a leaner, post-Fuss extended encore of hits is still a little flawed.
As with the previous night, This Is Your Life presumably gets on the set list because there’s a great bit you can wave your hands to, and, much as we love Runaways, few of us know all the words, so please stop handing over that first verse to us, Brandon.
But still, if in a couple of years, in this way, the Killers give the 20th-anniversary treatment to the Sam’s Town album (third track: When You Were Young, almighty on both nights of this tour), you’d be a fool to miss it.
Jamie xx
Carriageworks, December 8
★★★½
Reviewed by MICHAEL RUFFLES
When Jamie Smith visited Sydney as one-third of the xx in January 2018, he hid upstage, surrounded by equipment like Oz the Great and Powerful as exquisite tunes drifted over the Domain.
On Sunday he took centre-stage as celebrated DJ and solo dance-pop wizard Jamie xx and nearly disappeared in a blaze of strobe lights as he tried to blow the lid off Carriageworks.
Jamie xx often had the crowd in the palm of his hands.Credit: Gabrielle Clement
The bass vibrated around the cavernous sheds from early in Wanna, the opener to this year’s top 10 album In Waves, and the crowd was all under one roof rattling even as the show was only in first gear.
The energy only built with the frenetic Treat Each Other Right, and was then released with the blissful Still Summer, blending genres and mixing in tracks from earlier in his career along the way.
The set was well crafted, and songs were remixed together in fun and surprising ways. Smith took the long way into the juddering, explosive Kill Dem; there was a bit of a drift before he again had the crowd in the palm of his hands with the mesmerising 2015 monster Gosh.
While we wait for the xx reunion, here’s Jamie.Credit: Gabrielle Clement
Perhaps the highlight was Breather, which is really anything but. The studio version is a mix of YouTube yoga samples that builds to a climax over six minutes. Here Smith ran into it at high speed and gave the crowd only a few moments to inhale.
About an hour in, his bandmates Romy Madley Croft and Oliver Sim joined as disembodied voices for a barnstorming version of Waited All Night. Those after a reunion of the xx might have to keep waiting, but Madley Croft’s voice returned to the fore for Loud Places.
Not afraid of collaborating, Smith finished in spectacular style with help from the Avalanches (All You Children), Swedish pop star Robyn (Life) and Honey Dijon (Baddy on the Floor).
Visually, the show was a minimalist affair with bright lights and flickering shots of the crowd as Smith buried himself in the decks. While there was not much to look at, boy, did he give us something to dance to.
Jamie xx plays a second show at Carriageworks on December 9.
Good Things Festival
Centennial Park, December 7
★★★
Reviewed by PENRY BUCKLEY
In the middle of defiance anthem Clown, halfway through their headline set, Korn freeze. Drummer Ray Luzier appears large on the screen, drumstick suspended in midair. The audience’s anguish builds to a roar, before frontman Jonathan Davis playfully admonishes them as if they are the song’s antagonist (“Now, shut the f--- up!“) and the nu metal pioneers restart the single from their now-30-year-old debut album.
The performance is a perfect metaphor for a day of stops and starts, of setbacks and silver linings. It begins with a thunderstorm that means attendees at the alternative and metal festival are advised to delay arrival, and follows news earlier in the week that second-billed Sum 41 have cancelled their Australian tour (frontman Deryck Whibley has been diagnosed with pneumonia).
In the eye of the storm, Korn’s 80-minute set is untouchable, full of dark energy, from the distorted fairground guitar on Dead Bodies Everywhere to the bone-rattling bass on Ball Tongue. Davis’ bagpipe intro to Shoots and Ladders nods to metal’s ancient origins, and the whole audience thrills in raising middle fingers for record-company diss track and set closer Y’All Want a Single.
Korn are not the only ones celebrating an anniversary. Folk-punk heroes Violent Femmes play their self-titled debut album from start to finish in honour of the 40th anniversary of their first Australian tour.
Thousands sing along with vocalist Gordan Gano to the appropriate Blister in the Sun (after the rain clears, it’s a scorcher) and groove to the brushed drums on Add It Up and Gone Daddy Gone, while a rich brass section on Confessions provides some relief in a festival line-up heavy on thrash. Bassist Brian Ritchie thanks the headline stage’s Auslan interpreters before making “one more announcement”, launching into Dance, Motherf---er, Dance!
There are some inevitable problems with set times. Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan, whose solo slot on the second stage starts 20 minutes before Korn, loses much of his audience. While Korn play to tens of thousands, Corgan plays a gentle, intimate set of old hits, as well as a delicate acoustic cover of INXS’ Don’t Change, to just a few hundred.
But the festival is really about its fans’ diverse interests. As the band tees reveal, people are here to see Atlanta heavy metal band Mastodon, Melbourne punks the Living End, riot grrrl forerunners L7, or alternative rapper Grandson. Still, few discerning scene-heads can resist the pull of Jet’s 2003 Hottest 100 winner Are You Gonna Be My Girl, for which singer Nic Cester embraces his McCartney-esque metal scream.
In this sense, Good Things lives up to the festival ideal of creating a perfect society for its attendees. Nowhere is this clearer than on alternative stage 666, which hosts a talent show and air-guitar competition, and where festival-goers sing karaoke versions of System of a Down’s Chop Suey and Evanescence’s Bring Me to Life, backed by a full band. In a crowd of 30,000 metalheads and misfits, no one is left out.