Jess Porter, The Girl Fridas @ The Workers Club, Melbourne (08/04/2014)
We walked into the Workers Club and found a spot amongst the really cool plaster-less wall frames. Fortunately, we got in just in time to see Jess Porter. I was really excited to see him after seeing him play in folk outfit 'Velma Grove' last year who impressed me with their chilled out melodies and smooth instrumentals. But now it was his turn to impress solo, with nothing but a guitar, piano and new vocal pedals to keep him company on stage.
Firstly, I was a little confused on how he was playing two different sounding melodies at once. Later on he told the room that it was the first time he had used his new pedals in a live setting. They definitely made the songs sound more fuller and interesting compared to just singular un-layered vocals.
His sound reminded me a little bit of Incubus and Silverchair, with similar guitar tones and ever changing vocal notes. He has an awesome amount of instrumental talent, playing both guitar and piano (the guitar worked much better), but the lyrics were very literal, and sometimes a little cliche and predicable. But, he did a pull off a Bon Iver cover with flying colours which is hard not to be impressed with.
The next band, a three piece girl band called the Girl Fridas, were not as impressive. To be honest, apart from their cat outfits and constant smiles, I couldn't find anything to like about them. They cite their music as 'mixture of 80s shoegaze, 90s grunge, and 00s punk', but it sounded like each instrument was playing a different song on stage. The drums were out of time, the volume on the vocals were out and their first song revolved around the lyrics "I wanna cut you". They didn't seem very confident being on stage.
Ryan Hyde
Firstly, I was a little confused on how he was playing two different sounding melodies at once. Later on he told the room that it was the first time he had used his new pedals in a live setting. They definitely made the songs sound more fuller and interesting compared to just singular un-layered vocals.
His sound reminded me a little bit of Incubus and Silverchair, with similar guitar tones and ever changing vocal notes. He has an awesome amount of instrumental talent, playing both guitar and piano (the guitar worked much better), but the lyrics were very literal, and sometimes a little cliche and predicable. But, he did a pull off a Bon Iver cover with flying colours which is hard not to be impressed with.
The next band, a three piece girl band called the Girl Fridas, were not as impressive. To be honest, apart from their cat outfits and constant smiles, I couldn't find anything to like about them. They cite their music as 'mixture of 80s shoegaze, 90s grunge, and 00s punk', but it sounded like each instrument was playing a different song on stage. The drums were out of time, the volume on the vocals were out and their first song revolved around the lyrics "I wanna cut you". They didn't seem very confident being on stage.
Ryan Hyde