One of the U.K.’s finest early proponents of Britpop, The Charlatans have finally made it to Australia, playing their first ever Australian show at Melbourne’s QBH.
The large venue, relatively unknown to regular rock patrons (it’s usually used for DJs and dance parties), was fairly full of an incredibly diverse crowd.The band came on at around 9.30pm and in their hour and a half set played enough classics to keep the fans entertained, and enough new stuff to get the older fans interested in albums they previously hadn’t given a rats arse about.
‘Weirdo’ was the second song, which sent the crowd into the first frenzy of the night, but there seemed something wrong. The gigantic room unaccustomed to rock and roll drowned the sound in reverb and the key component of The Charlatans’ sound - the organ - was drowned out for most of the set.
Still, more classics came along. Singer Tim Burgess dedicated the band’s biggest hit ‘The Only One I Know’ to Hendrix drummer Mitch Mitchell, who had died the day before.
The band closed the main set with ‘This Is The End’, but were quickly back with an encore that saw the band suddenly click.
It was in these last three songs, ‘North Country Boy’, ‘How High’ and my personal favourite, the epic ‘Sproston Green’ that everything seemed to gel. Three of the band’s best songs coupled with a finally audible organ showed what the band was capable of.
While it was a great show overall, I couldn’t help but feel like the end was just a taste of what we could’ve had but didn’t.
