Nile Rodgers & CHIC, Live @ Fortitude Music Hall
(Australia & New Zealand Tour, 20th October 2023)
Good vibes and funk-disco energy, interspersing original CHIC material with mega-mixes of Rodgers-produced covers. The band’s rapport was palpable (note Rodgers’ slapping guitar duels/duets with bassist Jerry Barnes during the breakdowns). Highlights included Le Freak, I Want Your Love, and Get Lucky.
Buddy Guy: Damn Right Farewell
Live @ the Palais Theatre, Melbourne (10 April 2023)
86-year-old blues legend Buddy Guy still has a magnificent voice. His guitar work is sparing but he knows how to hold a crowd, riding his backing musicians while adding flourishes and indulging in occasional solos. Unfortunately he played very little original material.
Midnight Oil & First Nation Collaborators: Makarrata Live
@ Sirromet Wines, 28 February 2021
Frontman Peter Garrett brims over with spasmodic, shambling energy; Midnight Oil remain a loud and formidable, politicised unit: at times musically self-indulgent but culturally more relevant than ever. Highlights included First Nation, Power and the Passion (drum solo!) and The Dead Heart.
Billy Idol live @ Riverstage
(Brisbane, 31 January 2020)
Rocking out afront an 80s-reminiscent ever-changing neon cityscape backdrop, Billy Idol showed that he still has the voice, physique and strut of a man half his age (though perhaps not the stamina). Highlights included ‘Flesh for Fantasy’, ‘Rebel Yell’ and ‘Mony Mony’.
Tim Minchin live at The Star, Gold Coast
4 May 2019
Barefoot and brilliant, the inimitable Tim Minchin rocked the den of iniquity, enthralling with his energetic mix of anecdotes and skewed insights, rootin’-tootin’ ivory-tickling tongue-twistedness and intellectually rigorous leftie irreverence. Highlights included ‘Thank You, God’, ‘If I Didn’t Have You’, and ‘Prejudice’.
Colin Hay live at the Tivoli
21 April 2019
Colin Hay’s voice still soars, playing solo material and Men at Work classics given new life by his Cuban band and virtuosic multi-instrumentalist Scheila Gonzalez. Highlights included ‘Can’t Take This Town’, ‘Down by the Sea’, ‘Maggie’, ‘Down Under’ and ‘Next Year People’.
Ben Folds with yMusic
(Live in Brisbane, 18 August 2016)
Ben Folds is nothing if not reinventive, playing a mix of old and new material to the virtuoso accompaniment of New York chamber ensemble yMusic. Following several heartfelt slower songs it was his up-tempo numbers that gained most from the new arrangements.