Live Review: Regurgitator, Senyawa, Hedgehog

With t-shirts which simply say 'Masturbate' being one of the first things you see as you walk inside The Hi-Fi tonight, it's clear that not only the fans are excited to have Brisbane heavyweights Regurgitator back in town playing their hit albums Tu-Plang and Unit from spine to cover.

Opening affairs are Beijing trio Hedgehog, who hold their own and are rather entertaining despite the crowd still filing in and generally loitering around the bar rather than paying attention. Nonetheless frontman ZO is pepped full of energy, bounding around and owning the stage, the highlight of an interesting first act.

Next up Indonesian noise/experimental band Senyawa divide the house to polar extremes, the duo both confronting and confusing tonight's varied audience. Bottom line is they're inescapable with their handcrafted instruments (seemingly a guitar/percussion instrument wrapped around a piece of wood) fashioned by Wukir Suryadi and extreme vocals from metal growling to fast-paced chanting. Towards the end the crowd are getting more and more involved in proceedings, with vocalist Rully Shabara evaporating into a sea of people leading a call-and-response percussion brawl. 

Appearing in matching denim jackets and wasting no time tonight, Regurgitator kick things off to an appreciative audience with I Sucked A Lot of Cock to Get Where I Am with rather appropriate backing visuals projected on the back wall. Where to start? In a sea of hits on show Kong Foo Sing, Music Is Sport, Pop Porn and Blubber Boy all lead the charge for Tu-Plang and it's getting the crowd riled up to the point where Quan Yeomans stops the set and does the whole, “calm down fuckers” routine.

With a brief intermission, the band are back for Unit, now sporting silver jumpsuits bar non-conformist Seja Vogel, who's clad in yellow to match the album cover when surrounded by the lads. It feels a little strange that we're getting more – considering the decent serving we've received – and I Like Your Old Stuff Better Than Your New Stuff feels somewhat ironic considering tonight's concept. Still, it's the singles that lead the way – Black Bugs as per the norm is a natural highlight while Polyester Girl feels of the modern age with Vogel's up-to-date hardware. It is a quick delivery of the record with little banter in between tracks. The projections get slightly out of time due to extended jams, but the artwork is almost like a fifth member.

Wrapping up the end of Unit, the Gurg re-emerge for Blood And Spunk and then leave only to re-emerge for additional encore, well and truly pushing their luck with the venue yet pleasing the fans who are still craving more at the end of a chock-a-block night.