What can I say but these guys rocked.
The Tivoli club is a small
bar a little bit larger than the Catalyst but no bigger than the
Fillmore,
so to see these guys in that small a place and within
their own element was indeed a trip.
Before the Oils came on I was afraid that the opening band,
Front End Loader,
had caused enough hearing impairment to the
point where I would not be able to hear the band that I came
to see.
These guys were a cross between 70's punk and late 80's
thrasher speed metal.
With two guitarists, both playing the same
combination of a Les Paul through a Marshall half stack,
it was
difficult to sort out who was playing what in all the cacauphony.
The only chords they seemed to know were power fifths. This
combined with a drummer who looked like he was murdering his set,
and bass player who pounded out low ends and noisy bass chords
as hard as he could
WITH A PICK
made for a music that I just must
be too old to understand.
I didn't feel too bad though, because
I think the crowd was trying to endure them almost as much as I was.
They even played an encore, just to piss off the masses that kept
shouting, "OIL!"
Finally the Oils came on and rocked out and played hard.
Peter
Garrett is indeed a fireball of energy.
The stage set up had the
feel of a Vegas casino (almost like Disneyland?)
with electronic
poker machines and a big spinning wheel off to the side.
On the
64 slots on the wheel were many of the songs from the band's
reportoire.
When I took a long look at it, to my delight I saw that
Wharf Rat was also up there, so I was hopeful that it would get
played.
I even shouted Wharf Rat a few times while I was up close,
but I doubt they could hear me.
The audience was almost as loud
as the P.A.
Eventually I gave up on the whole I idea and moved
farther back from the stage.
I can only take the pushing, shoving,
and elbowing of a mosh pit for so long.
They played for almost two hours, ripping out many of their old
songs, then moving on to their radio hits that I was familiar with.
And even though they didn't play my request of Wharf Rat, all in all
it was a good first show for me here,
and hopefully a warm up for
more fun at the Lithgow Blues Festival that I am attending this weekend.
-DMo
