Live Review: EBONY BONES, REMI

Last Sunday night at Chevron Festival Gardens looked promising with a small, gathering crowd getting down to witness the delightful, down-to-earth Melbourne hip hop youngster Remi spit some rhymes alongside Perth-raised MC N'Fa Jones. Accompanied by DJ Dutch and his drummer, the winner of the triple j Unearthed Artist Of The Year for 2013 was a pleasure to watch on stage, his outrageous 'fro adding to his grand presence.
Indulging the younger crowd minus a few older crew, Remi got the audience vibing with popular track Saggin and fresh tune Livin off his forthcoming debut record, Raw x Infinity. Remi is a fresh breath of air in the Aussie hip hop scene and it was great to see him mingling with the crowd after his set.
What followed was almost an hour of waiting. It was almost 10pm by the time British singer-songwriter and producer Ebony Bones finally came on stage. A lot of people had left and those who stayed were restless. Accompanied by a drummer, keyboardist, guitarist and two average dancers/back-up singers who donned what appeared to be white horse masks, the sassy-looking lass launched into an electro rock-pop track that sounded, to be quite frank, horrible. Whoever designed the lighting for the performance obviously didn't know what they wanted because the stage was a permanent strobe with lights flashing throughout the duration of the abomination of a show.
Bones didn't even acknowledge or apologise for being so late but rather just yelled “Perth! Make some noise!” at the crowd repeatedly. But even these cries didn't seem like she was trying to get the audience on side; she sounded bored and monotonous, if anything. Facing the back of the stage with one leg kicked up on the drum kit for the majority of the show didn't help either. Hello, you're performing for an audience. At least have the decency to acknowledge them and look at them occasionally.
The breaks between 'songs' seemed to go on forever with Bones going over to each member of her accompanying band to say a few things. It was almost as if she was deciding the setlist as she went. The two dancers wearing horse-head masks, which later turned into giant-eye-like masks, appeared to be half in time to the music and out of time with each other's movements on stage. Even Bones' costume change, in which she donned a giant white sheet dress, didn't make up for what was a truly a less-than-average show.