Dwarves – Gig Review & Photo Gallery 4th May @ Boston, Perth WA

DWARVES
The Boston, Perth, WA
May 4th, 2017
Supports – The Sperts, Scalphunter, Pillar of Hope

The intimate venue of Perth’s Boston hosted the legendary Dwarves Thursday night which included a stellar local support cast for a night of depravity, shenanigans, political incorrectness and punk at its most unrefined; the way it should be. Described as “one of the last true bastions of punk rock ideology in the contemporary musical age”, the Dwarves were everything they should be, crude, loud, in your face but most importantly downright entertaining, that’s despite missing the comical and half the time naked, Hewhocannotbenamed on guitar, for reasons unknown.

Perth garage punk band, The Sperts hit the stage first, a quintet that even has room for a saxophonist, albeit a drunk one. These guys love beer, love some beer banter, love drinking beer, and did I mention beer? Beer rules and so do these guys. Bring ear plugs though, they are loud as fuck!

Scalphunter were next, always an energetic show and a staple around town for many years. You know what to expect with these guys, always tight, a stage presence that rival’s international acts and some very cool punk rock songs. A great set and you can catch them this Saturday night for more fun as they celebrate a brand-new video for ‘Men With Square Eyes’ at the Rosemount Hotel, North Perth. Check out the new video below…

Pillar of Hope rounded out the supports, a hardcore/thrash/punk mix that go back a decade with such classics as ‘Yuppie Cunt’, ‘Oi!, I Got a Tattoo’, and ‘Sk8 Drunk’. Straight up madness, shredding guitars and a cool as fuck drummer, shades and all. Despite one unlucky punter that almost broke his neck in a stage dive gone wrong (nobody caught the poor bloke!), POH was a killer end to an awesome trio of support bands.

Enter the Dwarves, with Fresh Prince of Darkness a.k.a Marc Diamond on lead guitar kicking off the band with the rollicking track, ‘Unrepentant’ then straight into ‘We Must Have Blood’, ‘I Will Deny’, ‘Demonica’, ‘Everybodies Girl’ and ‘Throw That World Away’. The first six tracks from the 1997 album, The Dwarves Are Young and Good Looking. What a way to start! Not a breath was taken between songs as vocalist Blag Dahlia, inhaled the beer fumes, sweat and punk madness surrounding him and exhaled the garage punk fury that the Dwarves have been thriving on for some 30 years.

When Blag does finally come up for air amongst the heaving mosh pit and abundance of king brown bottles being waved around (I kid you not), it’s a brief band intro and the first of many self-congratulatory sarcastic jibes as he introduces the next song as coming from “the greatest rock band of the last 30 years”.

As previously stated, HeWhoCannotBeNamed was a notable absentee however on again, off again Dwarves bass player, ex-Kyuss/QOTSA hired gun, Nick Olivera aka Rex Everything was superb. His backing vocals an absolute highlight (especially the screams) and everyone knows his prowess with the bass. The crowd, meanwhile were enthusiastic throughout especially keen to assist Blag on the couple of stage dives he completed towards the end of the set, no mean feat considering a) his age and b) the fact someone was knocked out during the supports earlier that night doing the same thing. ‘Back Seat of My Car’, ‘Let’s Fuck’, ‘Drug Store’, ‘Astroboy’ ensured the fans were kept happy with plenty of opportunities for some punk karaoke. In fact the whole night acted as a “best of” selection of Dwarves classics.

Can the rock stadium so-called punks please now fuck off. Dwarves is where it’s at.

Check out the photo gallery by Denis Radacic. Please credit Photographer and Wall of Sound if you use.