Live Review: Against Me! The Smith Street Band & Hoodlum Shouts

It's been eight months since Against Me! lead singer Laura Jane Grace (formerly Tom Gabel) announced in a Rolling Stone article her intention to live as a woman and her band, already one of the best live bands around, are reaping the benefits of a whole new dynamic with Grace out the front.

Hoodlum Shouts ran veins of folk-punk through their haunting, dark rock. Singer Sam Leyshon's distinctive vocals sat over the top of the music as the band created a sound inherently Australian but also quite bleak and unforgiving. At times The Smith Street Band's influences shone a little too brightly through their melodic rock, but their infectious enthusiasm and local references were easy to fall in love with.

Where Against Me! have always delivered blistering sets of straight-up punk, the confidence and ease that Grace brought to stage (along with a dazzling smile that seemed to illuminate even the darkest corners of the venue) gave this show a whole new intensity and plenty of rock star moves, something missing from earlier Against Me! shows. Drummer Adam Willard, a last minute replacement for the departing Jay Weinberg, had only weeks to learn the set, but the power coming from the back of the stage was a big contributor to the awesome rock display the very enthusiastic crowd lapped up. Careful to cover all eras of the band, the loudest singing was reserved for favourites such as, Thrash Unreal, Up The Cuts, Miami and Ocean.

It was obvious Grace took great delight in singing Ocean's now much talked about lines “If I could have chosen I would have been born a woman/My mother once told me she would have named me Laura/I would grow up to be strong and beautiful like her” - and the crowd took just as much delight singing them straight back.