I hadn’t been to the Royal Theatre in about a year. That night, I had
checked the beyond compare “The Roots” and the just ok Jurassic 5. Now
I was returning to see a similarly set up gig – the lesser known Way
Out West supporting the immensely popular Faithless.
Enough of us know Way Out West though… They rose to popularity with
that amazing breaks single Intensify around the time everyone was also
caning that Plump DJ’s mix of Orbital’s Funny Break, and their album
has been a recovery mainstay for years. Touring in support of their
new album, I was standing out in the foyer getting mobbed by my fans
when I had to ditch them all when the synth line to what is close to
their most popular song “Mindcircus” began. I ran inside. The
moderately full Royal Theatre crowd was standing, a few bopping, and a
core of WOW fans up the front orgasming left right and centre. I
copped the stage. There was the two core members – Nick Warren and
Jordy something or other positioned either side of the stage, with the
singer chicky in the middle looking on in anticipation of her cue to
sing, a bass guitar player and a drummer. WOW was officially a 5
piece. And they played Mindcircus, and we all loved it. Was it the
best rendition they could have done? No, but it was good enough.
Seeing that song rates up there with seeing Lamb do Goreki live, or
Oasis doing Don’t Look Back In Anger, or The Roots playing The Seed
2.0. More than one member of the crowd claimed that they could die
happily from this point on. The applause died down, and they broke
into some newer gear. Most of their live songs involved a rather long
intro (in some cases 4 or 5 minutes) but when the beats kicked in,
they were massive. Really really massive. I was impressed – something
proggy like WOW are takes a fair bit to impress me, but this was big
room dance music the way it was meant to be played – by a full band,
loudly. All of the players in WOW were contributing their part, and it
was an entirely enjoyable experience being blown away by the sonic
assault that was Faithless’s support act. Well, there was Jeff Drake
as well, but even though he played nicely, it was turned way down, so
the poor local support didn’t get heard by many, and seriously
listened to by even less. Kind of like the way they turn down all
local djs at the Royal Theatre (danielsan, milkbar nick and others ive
seen there…). Strange, slightly sad.
But the crowd (rent-a-crowd or not, there were lots of people there)
filled in nicely for the beginning of the main band. Faithless were
touring with 2 backing vocalists, a guitarist, a bassist, a drummer
and a percussionist, who’s percussion set up was only slightly less
impressive than the one Macy Gray toured with a few years back… Then
the spotlight shone on Sister Bliss, and I melted, and then Maxi Jazz
came out and the crowd went bonkers. The crowd was made up of lots of
old faces, and a fair few new ones. The disparity of this was
fantastic – old retired clubbing heads with their arms in the air
alongside lots of young, enthusiastic people appreciating the band.
Gotta say, the vibe was fantastic, and when they played the big songs
(Insomnia, We Come One, God Is A DJ) it was really impressive and fun
to be there. But for the slower songs, it lacked a little something.
It was quite obvious that the percussion section and the guitarist
were not mic’ed up nearly enough, I could see them moving but hear
virtually no output. And as much as I love her, Sister Bliss really
just plays some pretty basic keys… Scrap that, this is Faithless we
are talking about here… complexity would ruin what makes them so
popular. Sister Bliss performs her side of things admirably. Their
backing singer who got a lot of attention was ok, but in a kind of
played out “I wanna be Tricky”, but Maxi Jazz more than made up for it
- charisma, stage presence, and that really amicable voice… Some were
bored by it all, but for the most part the crowd was going off way
harder than I’ve seen Canberra rock out in ages and ages and ages. It
was really quite a sight to behold, and Faithless’ appreciation of
this was well noted at the end.
Overall, a fantastic gig. Way Out West were worth the ticket price
alone, and the vibe of the whole gig, especially considering it was a
Sunday night, was amazing.
