Live Review: Beach House & Wintercoats

Expectations are very high tonight, with the bill of Beach House and Wintercoats at the Forum a dream combination for some. Walking into the theatre at a shade past 8.30pm, the hauntingly beautiful chamber music of Melbourne's James Wallace, aka Wintercoats, echoes throughout the majestic surrounds. With just a violin, a microphone and a loop pedal, Wallace creates soundscapes for his audience and for the half-hour he's on stage he holds the growing crowd captive. The Melburnian has a decent alto voice, but belying his vocals and his rather shy stage presence sits the perfect balance of classical violin prowess and digital know-how. He combines the two to produce a full-band sound from one instrument: drums, bass, guitar and, um, violin.

Beach House – Baltimore's Victoria Legrand and Alex Scally – take to the stage amid rapturous applause. They begin with Wild from their amazing 2012 album Bloom, but with a terrible audio mix across the entire song it is an underwhelming opening. From there, Walk In The Park from 2010's Teen Dream steps it up a notch, although it's difficult to get past the muddled, bass-heavy sound that the band and their audio team are producing.

The pair are joined by Daniel Franz on drums for this tour, enabling Legrand and Scally to open up and flesh out the tracks from their back catalogue. It's a good start, but given the beautiful, ethereal nature of their records, a backing band of five or six players would've been much more effective. It's tempting to think that next time they're out they might bring with them a larger band, but when Legrand drops the phrase, “You never know, this could be our last show in Melbourne, ever”, it doesn't exactly inspire confidence in the band's longevity.

As they traverse their career, drawing on all their albums, it's hard to ascertain if there's a certain element missing from their set, but towards the end it becomes apparent that there are a number of aspects that could be improved. The sound quality is the real issue, with the three-piece unable to hit the climaxes that appear on their recorded work. Admittedly, it improves as the show goes on, but by the time Beach House uninspiringly return to the stage for their encore, many punters are already on their way out the door.  Maybe the expectations were a little too high?