Gig

West Thebarton - Gig Review & Photo Gallery 21st June @ The Triffid, Brisbane QLD

Walladmin

Heavy Metal Wordsmith

/10

Jun 22, 2019

7 min read

West Thebarton
The Triffid, Brisbane QLD
June 21st, 2019
Supports: A. Swayze & the Ghosts, Being Jane Lane

Boy, oh boy. What a goodie. West Thebarton + A. Swayze and the Ghosts + Being Jane Lane and at the great venue that is The Triffid? Friday night goals achieved. The West Theb fam have a reputation for being a very fun band, here to have a good time and lift everyone up with them. And that's exactly what the night was about.

Kicking off the night were locals Being Jane Lane and they pulled the early punters together and had them moving. If you've never seen these ladies play live before, it's genuinely a good time. They're honest performers who love being on stage together having some good old fun with each other and the crowd. Teigan Le Plastrier on vocals has a real raspiness to her voice at just the right times and looked as comfortable singing as she did talking. The ease of performing for this band was a joy to watch.

And then all the way from little ol' Tassie was A. Swayze and the Ghosts. And unlike the small island, they come from, this band is anything but little. With a retro vibe to their indie/punk/rock sound these guys brought the party. There was no build up of the crowd into a frenzied state, the fellas just jumped straight into it and the crowd responded. Frontman Andrew Swayze is very reminiscent of Mick Jagger in the way he moves and performs, and he was definitely the focal point throughout the whole set. Although the bassist did have an uncanny resemblance to Arctic Monkey's Alex Turner, that drew a few shouts.

They played a number of songs, including 'Suddenly', and a 'long one' where Swayze had time to jump the barrier and play the tambourine through the crowd, roll back on stage threw his mic and danced. It was one of the most incredible performances. Honourable mention to Swayze on his response to do a shoey though, "I'm not doing a shoey! I'm not Luca Brasi, fuck." He then pulled the dude up on stage and said he could do the shoey instead, poured his beer over the dude's head, shook his hand and all was well!

At this point the crowd was fully primed for West Thebarton, in fact, they were howling for them. And the band jumped straight into 'Cold Feet' and 'Stuck On You'. It's been a big topic in the music industry lately with punters getting a little too crazy, so it was great to hear frontman Reverend Ray announce that he had a couple of rules for the night - "Have fun, enjoy yourself and don't be a dick!"

From there it was smooth sailing. The comradery between the 7 band members on stage was apparent and they all had fun with each other: playing little jokes on stage, making faces, in fact it was impressive that they never bumped into each other at all. And despite being under the weather of late, Rev. Ray's voice had all the gusto as he paced the stage and bantered with the crowd.

'Moving Out' was a big sing along as was 'Glenn McGrath' which apparently they hadn't played in 6 months. And when they played the intro to 'Tops', well, let's just say that single is a success. 100%. West Theb ended on 'Bible Camp' and the moshing, crowd surfing, headbanging crowd seemed that they could've partied the entire night away.

West Thebarton are a good natured band that plays quality stuff. Always a good time with this gang and what an absolute 'tops' night.

Fuck the east, the west is the best!

Review by Ebony Story

West Thebarton Setlist: