Image credit: www.augiemarch.com.au
At first, a concert hall might seem like an odd choice for this gig but as the crowd flowed in – over a solid opening turn from local Adelaide band, Cosmo Thundercat – the location seemed somehow appropriate. Augie March’s music has always been more suited to listening than dancing anyway, and we might as well all be sitting comfortably. In fact, as Glenn, Adam, Edmondo, David and Kiernan sauntered on to stage, joined by the Arnold Horns, it started to feel like a relaxed listening party – hundreds of friends sitting in a lavishly appointed lounge room with an extraordinarily good sound system.
But what records were they playing? Well, all of them. Although this tour has come soon after the release of their latest album Havens Dumb, the band played from across their whole discography. The song – the one we all know – didn’t even come up in the main set. A cynical person might see this as a way to ensure an encore because no audience is going to stop clapping until they’ve heard One Crowded Hour. But viewed in another light, the set lists served to highlight the strength and depth of Augie March’s back catalogue. (And they did play it in the encore.)
Augie March have been notorious for occasional shambolic behavior in past large performances but this one ran pretty smoothly. There were the normal rough edges you expect in a live gig – tuning issues, remembering how the next song starts, peering at the set list – and Glenn Richards will never be James Brown, but musically they really delivered. The ensemble was tight, the lyrics were heartfelt and each song was an ornament to the evening. If the point of the set lists was to say, “look, we have all these other amazing songs,” then it succeeded because those songs were played very well indeed.
Richards’ was on song, his voice still spanning an incredible range, and his performance rang with emotional authenticity. Donovan, Ammendola, Williams and Box worked with him in the sort of practiced ease that means you can’t even see the hard work anymore. But hard work must have gone in at some point because they played like one brain with ten hands.
The live versions at this concert didn’t differ wildly from their recordings. This makes sense from a group that seems to put a great deal of thought into how each song should sound, balancing musical elements just so. So this live experience wasn’t a complete overhaul of the ingredients in each song but instead a chance to experience the same ingredients in a different balance. Ideas that were reined in for the album were allowed to push themselves forward just a little more: synthesizer chords moved from the background to become an uneasy, overarching drone; there was a touch more rubato in the phrasing; and of course quiet solo sections are always more captivating when you can actually see the fingers moving.
The Arnold Horns added extra meat to the band’s sound in the form of saxophone (or sometimes clarinet), trumpet and trombone. They were mainly confined to background with rich chords and rhythmic lines but they performed these duties to perfection and when they did get a moment in the foreground, they showed themselves capable of all the finesse and panache one could want.
The horns also allowed for the full Augie March experience. The band has always borrowed elements from a wide range of musical styles and it’s hard to add a touch of Motown without some brass on stage. So on the 27th there was some Motown. And some country, prog-rock, anthem rock and bluegrass. The baroque era seemed to have contributed a few keyboard lines and Philip Glass had lent some of his chords (mostly on purpose). As the evening progressed it was like sitting in a jeep made of soft, indie rock, travelling through a safari park of modern music, getting glimpses from the windows.
Augie March hadn’t been to Adelaide in more than six years so expectations were high upon arrival. After a concert of the band at their best, it was a very satisfied crowd that filed out of this listening party several hours later.
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Augie March
Her Majesty’s Theatre
27 March 2015
