Live Review: Courtney Barnett

Courtney Barnett has quickly become one of Australia’s proudest household names in music. Having recently toured through the UK, Barnett has jumped back into action to tour the motherland in support of her debut album. Her last visit to Adelaide saw two sold-out shows at Jive. This time around, Barnett has upgraded to The Governor Hindmarsh for another two sold-out events, last night’s pulling in a crowd of all ages and walks of life.

Opening support was local rock’n’roll band, The Yabbies. A somewhat unexpected and late-notice pick, the group rose to the occasion and exceeded expectations. Not all songs were gems, but the ones that were had a great amount of fuzz and contagiousness to them that made it easy to envision a smaller, more underground packed-out room grooving and shaking along. It was great to see so many punters in for the first set and even a couple warming up their dancing shoes.

Teeth & Tongue invited all on quite the dreamscape journey and had ears peaking interest with a new infusion of sound from song to song. Their alternate-pop, led by vocalist Jess Cornelius, drew the growing crowd in like moths to the glow. But ultimately, of course, it seemed the crowd was packing forward in preparation for the main event.

Courtney Barnett is still the girl we all fell in love with all those moons ago, able to pack a whole lot of punch into her set with her thrashy guitar work and the aggressive delivery of her mundane-turned-marvellous lyrics. With Dave Mudie and Bones Sloane by her side, she churned through the new album, Sometimes I Sit And Think, And Sometimes I Just Sit, with the addition of some older favourites.

Having had Dan Luscombe feature largely on the new album and the previous tour, there was a depth missing to this performance, though not one that left the crowd disappointed. Barnett’s on stage banter was minimal, mostly just checking in that everyone was doing okay and gracefully accepting the odd love declaration. It was especially cute and humbling when Barnett explained that she was unable to whistle, shortly followed by Bones making raspberries into the mic: “That’s you. That’s me being you whistling.”

With plenty of time still left on the clock it was a given an encore would follow, but that didn’t stop the crowd working for it with a lengthy roll of cheers and chants for Courtney’s return.

Sure enough the trio returned for their last hoorah, covering Being Around by The Lemonheads, her own track, Pickles From The Jar – how could she not while in Adelaide – and ending with an a second cover by, this time The Easybeats’  I’ll Make You Happy.

Yes Courtney, you absolutely did.