The Drums, Cults @ The Palace, Melbourne (03/02/2012)
When it comes to festival season, the stakes are high. Firstly you have to attract audiences on the day of the festival and then secondly, there are the sideshows. This Summer season saw acts being moved from one venue to another due to poor ticket sales and publicity departments working overtime to sell-out events. With so many festivals and several other events running so close together, the bid to snatch a fan was high.
The Drums and Cults may have sold out shows all over the world and be some of the more promising modern acts going around but they certainly had their work cut out for them in Melbourne last weekend. With M83, Yuck and gosh, almost every other fantastic band in town playing last Friday night, it was always going to be a challenge to sell tickets.
Wandering in to The Palace Theatre, it wasn’t hard to tell whose fan base this crowd consisted of. The Drums fanatics stood back cautiously as Cults brought their sweet New York City sounds to the unimpressive crowd. Madeline Folin swayed effortlessly and a little tiresomely on stage with her long dark hair covering her face. The crowd found it hard to connect but luckily Cults brought it home and may have converted a few new fans with their closer ‘Oh My God’.
It was time for The Drums to grace us and even though it was still a half full room, the crowd began edging closer to the stage to try and get a little more amongst it. The backdrop was a rich red neon brand that gave us some hope of a higher quality stage show. Suddenly silhouettes graced the stage without a word the Brooklyn lads open up with ‘What You Were’. The Drums drop into their set like they’ve surfed this wave a million times before. It’s lazy, over-rehearsed and lacks passion. Obviously unimpressed with the turnout, the band just move through the motions and eventually singer Johnny Pierce thanks those who could attend between songs saying, “I know we had a lot of competition tonight, so thanks for coming out to see us.”
My main complaint about this bands live performance is the very limited interaction between the band members and the little, often futile attempt to excite the crowd. I’m a firm believer that you should always work with what you’ve got and if it’s a small crowd, it’s still a crowd. Make it count for something. Eventually Pierce starts to warm up right around the time he drops their 2011 hit single ‘Money’ and the crowd are becoming much more receptive.
The show picks up despite the terrible sound and those right down the front start to get their money’s worth. The usual hits like ‘Forever and Ever’ and ‘Let’s Go Surfing’ are well received but The Drums truly redeem a floundering event with their peaceful performance of ‘Down By The Water’. Pierce somehow manages to make this song more romantic than it already is on a pretty heartwarming “final song”. Although The Drums reappear not too long after, the encore is almost meaningless and crowds tend to peel away.
To be honest the odds were not in favour of this co-headliner and maybe it’s an indication of too much to do, not enough time and not enough punters to go around. You’ll always be faced with difficult choices when two of your favourite bands go head to head on the same night but the people who lose out most are those who choose the wrong band and get a sub-par show on account of bruised egos. My final word on this one is redeeming; both The Drums and Cults brought it at Laneway Festival and still remain talented bands in my books, tonight was just not their night.
Samantha Dickson
The Drums and Cults may have sold out shows all over the world and be some of the more promising modern acts going around but they certainly had their work cut out for them in Melbourne last weekend. With M83, Yuck and gosh, almost every other fantastic band in town playing last Friday night, it was always going to be a challenge to sell tickets.
Wandering in to The Palace Theatre, it wasn’t hard to tell whose fan base this crowd consisted of. The Drums fanatics stood back cautiously as Cults brought their sweet New York City sounds to the unimpressive crowd. Madeline Folin swayed effortlessly and a little tiresomely on stage with her long dark hair covering her face. The crowd found it hard to connect but luckily Cults brought it home and may have converted a few new fans with their closer ‘Oh My God’.
It was time for The Drums to grace us and even though it was still a half full room, the crowd began edging closer to the stage to try and get a little more amongst it. The backdrop was a rich red neon brand that gave us some hope of a higher quality stage show. Suddenly silhouettes graced the stage without a word the Brooklyn lads open up with ‘What You Were’. The Drums drop into their set like they’ve surfed this wave a million times before. It’s lazy, over-rehearsed and lacks passion. Obviously unimpressed with the turnout, the band just move through the motions and eventually singer Johnny Pierce thanks those who could attend between songs saying, “I know we had a lot of competition tonight, so thanks for coming out to see us.”
My main complaint about this bands live performance is the very limited interaction between the band members and the little, often futile attempt to excite the crowd. I’m a firm believer that you should always work with what you’ve got and if it’s a small crowd, it’s still a crowd. Make it count for something. Eventually Pierce starts to warm up right around the time he drops their 2011 hit single ‘Money’ and the crowd are becoming much more receptive.
The show picks up despite the terrible sound and those right down the front start to get their money’s worth. The usual hits like ‘Forever and Ever’ and ‘Let’s Go Surfing’ are well received but The Drums truly redeem a floundering event with their peaceful performance of ‘Down By The Water’. Pierce somehow manages to make this song more romantic than it already is on a pretty heartwarming “final song”. Although The Drums reappear not too long after, the encore is almost meaningless and crowds tend to peel away.
To be honest the odds were not in favour of this co-headliner and maybe it’s an indication of too much to do, not enough time and not enough punters to go around. You’ll always be faced with difficult choices when two of your favourite bands go head to head on the same night but the people who lose out most are those who choose the wrong band and get a sub-par show on account of bruised egos. My final word on this one is redeeming; both The Drums and Cults brought it at Laneway Festival and still remain talented bands in my books, tonight was just not their night.
Samantha Dickson