Live Review: Jeremy Neale

It's a shame there aren't more people in house to listen to the strains of Pro Vita. The boys offer up just the sort of harmony-rich surf pop that tonight's crowd would salivate over, but alas, the venue's a ghost town when the Queensland four-piece run through their paces. It's a tidy performance, however, and more like this should see them pushing their way up bills fairly soon.

Attendance is better for The Good Sports, but only just, the couch scene in the front room still about as popular as the main floor in front of the stage. A big, long, hazy sound check-cum-jam brings on the set, before the Sports' scraggly rock settles into standard song structures. Liam Campbell is offering some nice stick work in a loose-fitting VB singlet, while the riffage from out front gets better as the set wears on. It would be amazing if we got a smile out of Lily May while she's playing tambourine, but hey, we can't have everything.

Feelings should be better than they are. A lot better, actually. We're pretty much witnessing Philadelphia Grand Jury 2.0, with the now defunct band's original line-up of Simon 'Berkfinger' Berckelman (bass), MC Bad Genius (guitar/keys) and D W Sweat (drums) together again on stage. This trio used to slay it live. Tonight, not so. Maybe it's the fact that the Feelings' material isn't that great? The falsetto guitar pop of One In A Million is the only track that stands up, aside from a couple of Philly J cuts (Going To The Casino, The Good News) that are thankfully thrown in to fatten up the set. Bad Genius is great to watch with his jagged moves, and when Berkfinger finishes the performance in the middle of the crowd before exiting out the front door (?) it concludes proceedings with a bit of spice. Sadly though, it's all pretty forgettable.

Sporting a badarse denim jacket and a Toronto Raptors cap, local wunderkind Jeremy Neale is looking comfortable in his role as headliner. Given this opportunity to put his stamp on the night, however, it doesn't translate any further than a solid set of classic rock sounds. It's a performance you can bank on from the prolific songwriter – all shaking hooks and revivalist stomp. But the best moments come when he strays from that formula, ramps up the intensity and rips out some unapologetic licks, going against the pop grain of cuts like Do Do Do and Merry Go Round. That is apart from In Stranger Times – what a fucking genius bit of songwriting we get there.