If you had the wandering eye, you just may have found yourself at the Tivoli on Saturday night being mesmerised by the smooth sounds of Joe Dukie and friends. They did not come empty handed to the city of sunshine, as they brought with them an amazingly talented cover act in the form of Melbournians Electric Empire.

The whole experience on Saturday night brought me flashbacks of my last awe-struck experience at the Tivoli. Not many places can boast being host to diverse music acts in dance, rock, urban and reggae genres (to name just a few). Indeed, one of the most amazing things about a concert at the Tivoli is that you could go there every weekend and yet you’d experience a different scene of music almost every time.

If you haven’t ever been to the Tivoli, do yourself a favour – find a gig that you’d like (not hard at all) and get yourself there. As soon as you walk through the vault-like wooden doors protecting what’s inside, you’ll know you are in a very special place. Intimate is an understatement for this venue and if you are a club punter so the hotel-like layout will feel very familiar. It’s quite obvious that your standard dance acts come with a roughly 18-25 year old audience, but it was clear the Fat Freddy’s had a much more demographically and culturally diverse fanbase.

It was around 8:30pm when the cover act, Electric Empire came on, and my +1 and I soon discovered the Electric in their name. Not many bands have all the band members singing their own songs as lead singers so it was quite refreshing to see these boys from down south give it a right ol’ crack. At one stage, it felt like they were almost channelling the great soul artists of the 70s. Yes, people – these boys got soul! If you are on a hunt for good music to serenade your better half (or soon to be), definitely get Electric Empire’s album. My +1 did feel out of place during some of the songs, as they were quite romantic and quite a few couples were really getting into “the music”.

Soon after the cover act, it was time to be mesmerised by what we all came for. In a very theatrical manner, the lights came on with only the DJ and bass guitarist in sight. Soon after an instrumental rendition began and the remaining members of the 7-piece band followed on stage. Last but not least was Joe Dukie donning an elegant black suit with equally stylish New Era baseball cap and sunglasses.

The band took us on a journey of their signature sound – a repertoire seamlessly blending together elements of soul, rock-and-roll and dance. True to their nature, there definitely was enough reggae to go around.The amount of respect the fans had for the band was clear, as every request by the band for everyone to put their hands up or applaud was met with great vigour.

As expected, the location was inspiring, the music was sonorous and the night was magical.