Live Review: The Kooks, The Belligerents

If ever you're in need of a feel-good live act, head right on over to see The Belligerents.

Complete with some very expressive dancing, high flying high kicks and reminiscent recorder playing, the Brisbane five-piece certainly brought the party with their fervent show, complete with tracks like Science Fiction and Ghost VS.

The Hordern was full before The Kooks even walked on out on stage. The lights dropped suddenly and a medley of classic rock and pop songs slowly morphed its way into The Clash's Rock The Casbah. Lights flashed and then all of a sudden, with a million screams from the crowd, The Kooks hit the stage with a, "Good evening, Sydney."

They didn't hesitant, heading right into Eddie's Gun, with frontman Luke Pritchard's voice sounding pretty bloody close to the original recording from 2006's Inside In/Inside Out. It was apparent quickly that the night would be one filled with singalongs, which was proven again when the band started Sofa Song.

"We hope you have a beautiful time. This is our last single," said Pritchard before heading into Be Who You Are. Given that it was a show slated as Best Of, it would be easy to think this wouldn't have been well received. So, so wrong. The crowd ate it up, joining in for the very catchy tune. "How amazing are you?!" said Pritchard upon wrapping up, which the crowd loved.

They pressed through a few more tracks, including Ooh La, Bad Habit and Down, before Luke and bassist Peter Denton hugged after, again, expressing their admiration of the crowd. Do You Wanna followed before the rest of the band left and Pritchard sat solo at a keyboard, to play See Me Now, a track written for his late father.

The band returned and pressed through Matchbox, Sway, See The World and Shine On, before they wrapped up the main set with Pritchard saying, "Thank you guys so much for supporting us and letting us play shows like this for you," and moving onto Junk Of The Heart (Happy).

Encore calls started immediately after the cheers ceased, with the floor of the seating area physically rumbling under the pressure. Pritchard returned, solo once again, and played a huge version of Seaside, with phones and bodies in the crowd high up in the air.

"I think we forgot a few songs - let's rectify that," he told the crowd as the other band members walked out.

Always Where I Need To Be and Naive closed out the show, and if you looked just closely enough as Pritchard thanked the crowd and turned away, you could swear he was wiping away tears.

Though it was totally based in nostalgia, The Kooks brought their A-game to the Hordern and shared a set that certainly made up for all those uneasy ones in their 20s.