Live Review: Quarter Street, The Public Opinion Six

"We got an email from Larry Harlow saying he likes our shit," boasts Sergio Botero, frontman for Melbourne salsa dura ensemble Quarter Street. It's well worth boasting about, especially as the group launch their long-awaited debut EP. There could be few higher commendations for an ensemble that sees itself as a 21st century heir to the heavy-duty salsa plied by Harlow et al in 1970s New York. Salsa dura (unlike, say, the Latin pop-slanted salsa romantica) elevates musicianship and improvisation.

It's a characteristic Quarter Street shares with Hope Street labelmates The Public Opinion Six, who earlier in the night get The Gaso cooking with their fiery brand of West African funk. During the set, the group's founder, Hope Street uber-producer Tristan Ludowyk, switches effortlessly between keys and trumpet, while both blending and duelling with hirsute saxophonist Nick Lester on the opposite side of the stage. Meanwhile, Senegalese vocalist Lamine Sonko makes syncopation an art with his single-handed bongo bursts; just as impressive, though, is his other hand, which taps a shekere against his leg with metronomic precision. This fine tension between precision and looseness continues deep into Quarter Street's set.

Incongruously, for a genre synonymous with dance, there isn't much room for more than some slouchy shuffling, though we try our damnedest. During DJ Emma Peel's Latin flavoured set, the crowd pulls back so that a half-dozen pairs of hip-swivellers can strut their stuff, but once the main act hits the stage we push forward again.

A Quarter Street gig at a more dance-orientated venue would be a very different beast (indeed, they are no strangers to The Night Cat), but tonight it's salsa-music-as-spectacle, evidenced by the rows of head-boppers in the peanut gallery and arrayed Brady Bunch-style on the open staircase. And why the hell not? There's plenty to see. Not least of which is the ensemble's formidable wall of brass, led by Cuban trumpet virtuoso Lazaro Numa, with Ben Gillespie and Jimmy Bowman combining for some downright filthy trombone lines — tight, brassy harmonies, swift-tongued solos and a tonne of sleazy gliss. Botero is the consummate salsero, sexy with a hint of world-weariness; he shares vocal duties with conguero Luis Poblete. Quarter Street is an ensemble in the true sense of the word — there are no stars, or, rather, each member stars equally. At one point, percussionist Cristian Saavedra trades in a bullet-crack bongo solo for an on-beat cowbell without missing a step, ceding the spotlight to Poblete and his thunderous congas. Everyone is having a lot of fun, band and crowd alike.