Live Review: The Lumineers, The Falls

It's Good Friday, and the distinct sense of revelry is in the air as the hordes move swiftly through the welcoming doors of the Corner Hotel. Sydney duo The Falls take to the stage a little after 9pm. Their brand of acoustic, harmonic tunes is easy to enjoy, and their lilting love songs have couples throughout the room holding hands and looking deeply into each other's eyes.

On a good day, it's tough for a duo like this to keep the attention of a sold-out room as big as this, but The Falls do as good a job as they could've hoped for in focusing all eyes to the front of the stage. Triple j fave Home goes down a treat, and for those in the audience familiar with their Hollywood EP the set does not disappoint. To top it off, an excitable bunch of Canadians at the front of the stage almost lose their shit when the band drop Neil Young's Heart Of Gold.

At 10.15pm, Denver band The Lumineers bound onto the Corner stage in a flurry of activity and excitement. They launch straight into Submarines and the excellent Classy Girls and, before anyone can think, the entire crowd is singing along. By the third song lead singer Wesley Schultz has the audience eating out of the palm of his hand, the band looking as though they'd just travelled from an episode of Boardwalk Empire.

It's a surprise when they drop Ho Hey early in the set, but it doesn't stop an eruption of noise from all corners of the room. It's even a bigger surprise though, when the band kick out a rollicking version (as if there's any other way) of Bob Dylan's Subterranean Homesick Blues. By the time they play Stubborn Love the set has reached fever pitch, but it's just a precursor for what's about to happen.

Carrying their instruments and chairs out to the middle of the crowd, and ushering a silence and for everyone to put away their camera phones (one of many much-appreciated live-in-the-moment-and-put-your-phones-away requests of the night), they play Darlene completely unamplified. It's a goosebump-inducing moment and is followed up by a raucous rendition of Flapper Girl. It's hard to remember a time when a crowd was as genuine about getting an encore as tonight, but there's no disappointment. Good Friday? How about Fucking Great Friday.