As the clock ticks we wait in the box office queue, each three-or-so minute block of time translating to another song by The Church missed. The woman who comes out of the venue, spots her mate in the line and announces, “They're happening. You're missing out!” is asking for a bunch of fives. Finally inside, it's immediately apparent the crowd is captivated. The last half of the last song sounds incredible. Curse that brutal St Kilda traffic. Thankfully A Day On The Green is on the cards tomorrow. (Highlight from The Church's set in the Yarra Valley the following day is Under The Milky Way, plus Steve Kilbey's classic comment: “When they asked me whether I wanted a day on the green, I thought they meant a bag of pot.” They totally should've played Unguarded Moment though considering this is supposedly their last-ever gig.)

The Palais dunnies could certainly use a zhoozh. It's no fun at all when the door doesn't lock and/or the dunny doesn't flush. Both red AND blue energy domes are for sale at the merch, catering for purists as well as those who embraced the marketing research that led to a change in headgear colour for the band's latest Something For Everybody album. They're $45 though, so a bumper sticker will suffice. Devo's starting time is 8pm and last time they graced our stages they were sporting yellow boilersuits and red energy domes. They arrive onstage in their updated grey uniforms with The Phantom Of The Opera-style half masks and are energetic from the get-go. Don't Shoot (I'm A Man) from their newest album sees unison jogging and the animated video clip decorating the back screen. It feels weird to remain seated when Devo are so anti-establishment. Robert “Bob 2” Casale hams it up a lot and will break a hip during Fresh one day if he's not careful.

All free arms onstage point toward Bob Mothersbaugh for guitar solos and the small amount of chorey that's incorporated into tonight's set (including gunfire mime) is a hoot. Masks come off and blue energy domes go on. “It's all getting a bit wiggly out there,” announces the bespectacled Mark Mothersbaugh and he may or may not be referring to the fact that their T-shirts in the merch go up to XXXXL these days. Whip It gets us on our feet, sounds incandescent and still edgy. Drummer Jeff Friedl is more precise than a drum machine. After a costume change into the authentic yellow boilersuits and red energy domes comes (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction. Devo's version has an undetectable time signature that's impossible to dance to, but it's kinda sexy in a weird way.

The two sets of bros make a diamond formation downstage centre and perform unison scissor actions with their legs. One of them nearly trips over his own feet. There's a female usher cutting sick in the aisle. Fair go! If we've been instructed we can't dance in the aisles, she shouldn't be able to. The red and yellow cheerleader pom poms look like they're made from Ronald McDonald pubes and the amount of keyboards onstage is insane. The band members rip their boilersuits off during Uncontrollable Urge and then throw them into the crowd during Jocko Homo (“Are we not men?/We are Devo”) – even Baryshnikov would have trouble keeping the beat. Bob Mothersbaugh's suit gets stuck to his finger as he tries to fling it a long way into the crowd. It falls way short, into the front row, and he gets embarrassed. His brother Mark belts out an impossibly long, lung-busting “THANK YOOOUUUUUUUUU!” And we're devo it's over. Devo bend our heads in the best possible way.

Simple Minds round out our stellar night's entertainment and frontman Jim Kerr certainly loves a grand gesture – there's lotsa pointing and circling a pointer finger above his head like a lasso as well as lying on the stage. Not enough credit is awarded Charlie Burchill's guitar playing: it's understated and shimmering – what a perfectionist! Love Song's a well-received masterpiece that rouses all to their feet. First-rate bassist Ged Grimes stalks about up there and also happens to look damn fine. Our enthusiastic “Laaaaa/La-la-la-laaa” singalong during Don't You (Forget About Me) sees Kerr praising, “You're almost putting me out of a job. I should be paying you!” (Way too kind.) Someone Somewhere In Summertime is such a succinct yet evocative chorus, sung with much conviction by Kerr, to whom summer days are justifiably precious (being a Scotsman).

The four-song, old-school encore is killer: Sanctify Yourself, Promised You A Miracle, Glittering Prize and Alive And Kicking. Sanctified, we leave the venue to discover it's been raining. Kerr's lot are ace, but Devo are impossible to top. Cranking up the live recording of tonight's Devo set in the car stereo on the way home confirms what we just heard was exceptional. A souvenir to cherish that cost less than a plastic energy dome!