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ISEven before arriving on a sweltering day at Sydney’s Olympic Park, the adjectives about Saturday night’s big concert were reinforced into superlatives.
Greatest Southern Nights is the name of the state government’s support for 1,000 Covid-protected concerts across New South Wales in November, but this evening is the first of the final two-concert program called Greatest Southern Nights.
Ultimately, it will be the young men here in pastel-colored shorts and the women in crop tops who decide if their southern night was great or even “the greatest”. But at least the extra marketing grit is guaranteed. The two concerts may be limited to 6,000 of the 21,000 people that the Qudos Bank Arena can host, but they are still the largest indoor music events in Australia since March.
Just don’t ask why sporting events in NSW have been admitting up to 40,000 spectators since October 1st. Hypocrisy or health advice, nobody seems to know, but final opening act Jack River – who leads a band that plays pop-rock sparkling like a whistle – has an idea. “I was thinking we could start classifying events like this as soccer matches,” he says. “Gladys, solve the problem.”
And if the quiet northern beaches, Ocean Alley, in six pieces, featured a little more of the dynamism and unpredictability that even a mid-level sporting match might have gravitated towards something big tonight. At around 9:45 pm, however, half an hour into a series of songs so unchanged in vibration and rhythm that they are powerfully soporific even at volume, a sweep around the stadium reveals more than a few fans stifling a yawn.
Live, like on records, because there’s not much difference, Ocean Alley’s songs evoke the ghost of so many good things – blues, psych, R&B and funk – that just can’t fully materialize. Guitar breaks tend to sound like the passionate dad of someone sampling a new guitar in the store and while the introduction of the wah pedal on Happy Sad elicits a lot of pornographic promise, the climax never comes. “Well, it could have been good / Well, it could have been great,” sings the singer and Baden Donegal.
During the set of the opening act Ruby Fields, the phone’s flashlights had been lit and swayed to the sound of his song Redneck Lullaby. Yet the ritual is not repeated during the Ocean Alley set, perhaps because the lyrics are so full of clichés that it’s really hard to tell what it is. Mired in emotional middle-earth, no one will swing a light when they’re not sure if they’re bound to feel sad or happy.
Which is not to say the band’s hits from 2018’s Chiaroscuro record (which finished second in Triple J’s Hottest 100 that year) like Confidence and Mellow Yellow don’t get a cordial response. Twice, the security guards who look very intimidating with their mouthpieces tied on black masks, walk to the front seat area to seat people again.
A few hand gestures are enough. Even before the pandemic, stadiums teetered on Orwellian and Covid only tightened the grip of rules and registers. Masked employees are seemingly everywhere and with the arena only a quarter full, the shiny foyers shine like hospital corridors when you move to the bathroom. On stage between acts, instead of fun stuff, the screens go through immense black and white graphics of hand washing techniques and how to cough and sneeze.
Security measures are needed and it is wonderful to see so many people returning to work. The first show at the stadium is an event to celebrate because it won’t be the last. Huzzah! But as tonight’s gig proved, with mandatory empty seats and rules rules that seem more oppressive in this context, more than ever, we need bands to cheer us up and out.
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