Live Review: Earlwolf

“What's up, assholes?” says Tyler, The Creator, greeting the sold-out Palace. Earlwolf, the duo comprising Tyler and fellow Odd Future member Earl Sweatshirt (with Jasper Dolphin and Taco Bennett joining the tour), have just exploded out on stage with French, which sends the crowd mental. It's the first time any of Odd Future's subgroups have toured Australia and it's also Sweatshirt's first time here (he was still at school in Samoa during the group's previous tours). More importantly, it's probably the best of any Odd Future tour so far.

The set is a mix of both members' solo songs, with their few duo songs thrown in. They each provide backing vocals for the other, with Dolphin adding his own and filling a sort of hypeman role, while Bennett provides the music from a laptop. Tyler's songs such as Yonkers, Domo23 and Jamba have the entire floor area dancing and moshing in equal parts, while We Got Bitches gives Dolphin and Bennett a chance to show off their own rapping and Odd Future's dumb, party side.

The majority of the set comes from Tyler's solo output (three albums compared with Sweatshirt's one, to date), which is broken up by Sweatshirt, or group tracks, every few songs. About halfway through the set, Bennett plays the piano sample from Gucci Mane's Lemonade and the crowd collectively loses it – it's Orange Juice, one of the older Earlwolf songs and arguably one of the best of all the Odd Future output. Sweatshirt takes over the set for a few songs after this, while Tyler sits and uses his inhaler. We get older songs, like Earl, and a few new songs after Sweatshirt confirms a July release for his album, Doris. Despite his absence over the last few years, Sweatshirt has lost none of his skill and has no trouble flawlessly reeling off his impressive rhymes.

Disappointingly though, he doesn't perform his Oldie verse, despite Tyler and Dolphin's challenge after they each do theirs. This is one of the few flaws of the show – several songs only get partial renditions because their guests aren't here tonight. The omission of crowd favourite Radicals is cruel too. Instead, the show ends on Sandwitches. As soon as Tyler gives the signal, the floor erupts into multiple circle pits and the whole room shouts in unison, “WOLF. GANG.”