Live Review: Wire, Per Purpose, Multiple Man

Tonight heralds the arrival of one of post-punk's true pioneers to the seething sweatbox otherwise known as The Zoo, but it is also exciting to see two local acts getting deserved stage time alongside these titans. First up is Multiple Man, an iconoclastic doppelganger duo of dead stares and temporal tears. Their set is one of progressive repetition, ratcheting up the tension in increments – a synth black hole that swallows up any ounce of human empathy and emotion before spitting it back out in a bilious sepulchral dirge. It's a stark, stifling introduction to the night's proceedings from one of Brisbane's best bands, yet still they bemused some of the more stalwart Wire fans, an outcome the Campion clones would undoubtedly revelled in.

Per Purpose forgoes any foreboding and smash straight into atonal raconteur mode, ensuring their set will be remembered as the most unhinged. That's not to say that the four-piece don't have a modus operandi – on the contrary, the band's penchant for off-kilter deconstructions is feverish conceptions of careful erection. Per Purpose always come across as an amorphous act, a restless beast never sure of where their allegiances lie, therefore bristling with sweat-stained agitation, a caterwaul of tension bailed up in the corner with nothing left but to slash its way back out. Each member of the band play their instruments as if they are throttling unwieldy machines of unknown origin, barely containing the fury within, while Glan Schenau's gnashing-teeth/guttural pronunciations are at once confronting and mesmerising.

Wire enter the fray to a sombre ambient drone, and this foreboding opening sets the tone for what is a beguiling set. The Londoners are renowned for circumventing genre stylisations into their own uncharted territories, and it's clear that this also goes for their setlist, which for the most part avoids the iconoclastic oeuvre of breakout album Pink Flag (or indeed any of their '70s hit albums) for more sinuous, brooding tracks. This abject refusal to play the songs they are known and loved for could be seen as a righteous slap to the face, but there is something much more considered taking place here. As the band goes from the languid ruminations of Marooned to the pneumatic syncopations of Drill, the retro-futurist rock of Doubles & Trebles or the abstract punk hypnotism of 23 Years Too Late, that Wire aren't interested in revisiting 'hits', but are still as adamant about making a statement 40 years on. Only one track crawls out of the '70s period, evident from the sudden roar from the crowd, but it just as quickly flies by, segueing into another latter-day track. The perfect encapsulation of tonight's show is encore closer Harpooned – a crawling miasma of dripping tautness and steely resilience, where the tension is palpable and not readily cast off. Wire deliver a clinical masterclass in atmosphere and statement – indelibly impressive so many years after the epoch of their punk movement impact.