PondWhen Reef Prince raps about being from the west coast, he means Perth. With song titles like Abalonely B0i, he seems funny and self-aware as he bops around the stage to his trap beats. Reef Prince takes the scant crowd admirably in his stride, shouting, "There's, like, 15 people here. I love you all!" His frequently double-tracked, occasionally Auto-Tuned words are sometimes tough to make out, but his husky voice and slurred delivery distinguish him from most Aussie hip hop acts, which is a good thing.
Starting a set with The Ronettes' Be My Baby beat is like announcing that your band isn't totally original but you have good taste/melodies and are pretty fun to watch. Such is the case with Sydney's four-piece garage-pop group Body Type. The girls each take turns singing in pleasant, fashionably flat voices. There is an intrinsic sweetness to this band as they sip from Nalgene water bottles between songs and banter about which band member is a Hufflepuff. Having only been playing together for 18 months, Body Type is a band to watch.
When describing the experience of seeing Pond live, it feels more appropriate to reference movies from the '70s and '80s rather than other bands. As such, tonight's set is a combination of Close Encounters Of The Third Kind and Flashdance, right down to the way singer Nick Allbrook's wide-neck shirt hangs off the shoulder. Beginning with the great one-two punch of 30000 Megatons and Sweep Me Off My Feet, the band take us on a sci-fi journey soundtracked by their synth-heavy, psychedelic space-pop.
Their set draws mostly from this year's The Weather, with older, less poppy highlights like Waiting Around For Grace and Don't Look At The Sun Or You'll Go Blind sprinkled in for good measure. Allbrook has a fascinating physicality, with theatrical expressions and balletic movements. Hardly a verse goes by that isn't punctuated by a reverb-soaked shriek or "woo"!
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Bassist Jay Watson assumes lead vocals on the epic Sitting Up On Our Crane, while Allbrook's flute parts on Zen Automaton bring the band's Pink Floyd influence to the fore. Edge Of The World Pt 2 is the thrillingly climactic centrepiece in the set, with everyone singing in unison by its cacophonous finale. The band answers the crowd's calls for, "One more song! One more song!" with their opus Man It Feels Like Space Again. And man, it really does.
