Big Day Out 2004: Adelaide Review

While there's no sign of baking skills when the peculiar little fellow and his musical troupe emerge on the main stage early this afternoon, the Steele Gang quickly set the crowd abuzz. Preliminary Lovers single Vampire Racecourse initiates today's performance with style before Cavaties (sic) devolves into a cacophony appropriately described on the band set-list as ' NOISE '. An enthusiastic punter throws a Plucka Duck toy onto the stage and Steele quickly sits the plush doll up on the front of the throbbing bass drum to enjoy the show. With Luke dressed in the same gaudy James Dean t-shirt that he was clad in at the Melbourne Big Day Out, for the sake of his band mates it's hoped that the diminutive frontman has been using the hotel laundry service on the three days in between gigs. Remaining staunchly unfathomable as Sleepy Jackson popularity grows, Steele's guitars are pasted with phrases such as "Widen The Storm Of Light" and the more coherent "You Presidents Should Not Use Your Power Ruthlessly". While Good Dancers and Come To This are as wondrous as their studio counterparts, Miniskirt this afternoon suffers from flat vocals. Singing inadequacies are forgotten by the time Rain Falls For Wind and a rumbling, tumbling, crumbling slash through Pack Of Nails closes the set, proving that in a world of reconstituted rock, The Sleepy Jackson is the source of something fantastically fresh.

Outdoing Luke Steele's quirky fashion sense is The Darkness on the Blue Stage. A band that benefits from close viewing, the Suffolk quartet introduces themselves to the crowd with a searing instrumental twiddle before rocking into Black Shuck . Lead singer Justin Hawkins (he's the one with Justin tattooed on his left bicep) asks if anyone has heard the debut album Permission To Land , which he describes as "currently riding high in the outer reaches of the Top 100 in Australia!" before attacking Growing On Me and a song Justin claims is "for people with Tourette's", Get Your Hands Off My Woman . After a small chap who is the spitting image of Richard Branson goes crowd surfing over the top of the barrier during Givin' Up , Justin returns to the stage dressed in a garish violet and black jumpsuit replete with devil tail and angel wings sewn into it. Dispensing with I Believe In A Thing Called Love as he bounces exuberantly across the stage, Justin calls for some audience participation. "Give me a 'D'! Give me an 'Arkness'!" he proclaims before closing The Darkness' silly yet strong set with Love On The Rocks With No Ice . Similarly great at getting the crowd moving are the Black Eyed Peas. In a show that sometimes resembles a feel-good pantomime, the act behind the chart-topping album Elephunk move from early classics such as 1998's Master Jam through to the un-PC musings of Elephunk highpoint, Let's Get Retarded . With Justin Hawkins returning to the stage to play a super-charged guitar solo for the Peas, the band finish their set with their massive hits Where Is The Love? and Shut Up . Although detractors may level the band have sold out since their Big Day Out debut a few years back, even the most begrudging commentators would have to admit the band put on a great live show.

Something For Kate's addition of a cover of Echo And The Bunnymen's Killing Moon blows out their allotted slot by almost ten minutes, causing the legendary Dandy Warhols to appear on the adjacent main stage later than hoped. When they finally arrive, the swagger in their step indicates they are feeling livelier than when they hit the stage at Melbourne's Big Day Out a few days earlier. Keyboardist and tambourine floozy Zia McCabe is demurely dressed in a short black dress, although her brown cowboy boots diminish any chance of her fashion style losing its bohemian qualities. Zia's three male band mates Courtney Taylor-Taylor, Peter Holmstrom and Brent De Boer are decked out in choice retro t-shirts, although Pete is also tackling the risky double-denim combo of jeans and jacket. With a fetching cream Fender Commando at his disposal, Courtney kicks off the set with a low-key rendition of Welcome To The Monkey House before Not If You Were The Last Junkie On Earth enlivens proceedings.

Appearing rejuvenated after a fairly lifeless performance on Monday, Pete today dances around the stage during Solid and - like his band mates - appears far more animated than at the prior interstate show. The improvement in Courtney's vocal quality is apparent by the time We Used To Be Friends is performed (Courtney later confides to me that his vox troubles in Melbourne merely stemmed from the previous night's rock excess rather than anything viral) and members of Jet, Kings Of Leon and The Datsuns nod their subdued approval from the stage wings. Paying tribute to their Australian rock forebears, AC/DC track Hells Bells is given a tidy Dandys workover, aptly seeing Holmstrom donning a Gibson similar to Angus Young's. At the conclusion of the trumpet-enhanced cover, Zia smiles as a love struck young buck in the audience shouts out to her, "Tambourine Woman I love you! You're beautiful!" The hot-blooded fan's heart would no doubt be further sent aflutter minutes later when Miss McCabe shows cheek towards BDO pal Fergie on the side of the stage by flashing her black knickered bum in the direction of the bemused Black Eyed Peas singer during Get Off . Zia downs her third Corona before Thirteen Tales From Urban Bohemia favourites Bohemian Like You and Horse Pills finalise the set on an energetic high.