Angus & Julia Stone - UC 13th October

After seeing them perform at the Big Day Out earlier this year and buying all of their EPs and their new album, I was really looking forward to seeing Angus & Julia Stone.

The line into the UC bar went right back near to where the hoppers were when we rocked up there at about quarter past 8 - doors opened at 8. Every person who bought a ticket was required to show their ID, plus it seems that a lot of people ordered tickets through Moshtix - meaning they had to swipe their moshtix/credit card as well. The advantage to it taking so long to get in is that while we were getting ID'd Angus & Julia were making their way to 'backstage'. Two things were evident - 1) They're both tiny; 2) Angus STILL has not cut his hair/beard. Very distressing.

We'd had a drink or two before we got there (more on THAT later) and so lined up for a drink. The story is that the Green Room used to be located somewhere else, but has now shifted to the UC Bar. Green Room: GET SOME MORE BAR STAFF. We waited 25 minutes to be served by one of the three bar staff (a fourth appeared jus before we got to the front of the line) and hey had no bottled water and no cruisers. So I bought two double vodka with coke premixes and a cup of water.

The support act was Orange Bird (who for some reason I can't find the MySpace page for) and they were all right - they looked pretty metal with long hair and flannies, but they did some soundscapey type stuffm some work with a big drum and some gongs and a crazy girl with a headband over on the left. I do recall the drummer being pretty damn awesome though.

Angus & Julia Stone came on at about 10pm, just as a couple of tall guys and some short girls walked past with the good ol' 'excuse me' and stood right. in. front. of me. Damn I hate that. As a result, I spent a good part of the show staring at the zit on the back of the guys neck and trying to get a glimpse between the heads of middle bro and youngest bro who were standing a few 'rows' ahead of us. So I didn't really get to see that much (each glimpse of Angus as a hairy monkey didn't really help much either). Most of the songs they performed were off the new album - for those of you playing at home, I think they played the following (not in order):

- The Beast
- Wasted
- Just a Boy
- Hollywood
- A Book Like This
- Soldier
- Another Day
- Mango Tree
- Paper Aeroplane
- Private Lawns
- Tubthumphing
- An untitled track

I think I'm missing some, so will check with the bro's and get back to you. I'm glad they did Paper Aeroplane as it was my first and favourite track of theirs; Tubthumping was played while we were in line for the bar so didn't really hear it (though The Hun's sister said she hated it) and the untitled track was a beautiful song they've written for a friend getting married that I do hope they release.

I do wish they'd done 'Sadder than You', 'What You Wanted' and 'All of Me' - Julia has a fantastic voice and she did a fantastic job of 'What You Wanted' at BDO - very piercing. I also wish Angus spoke up a bit more when he talked as he was a mumbler, and there were a lot people talking all the way through! Not to mention zit-neck guy in front of me; and the couple that decided to stand next to us and sway, bumping me and The Hun and my handbag each time - I had to release my elbows to my hips so they could 'enjoy' it as much as we did. Overall, I ranked the night a 9/10 (points off for not eating enough before going, making me a bit sulky when The Hun told me to shut up when I called out to middle bro to move his head to the right), middle bro ranked it a 10/10, as did one of our friends who hadn't heard much of them before but decided to come along after hearing some of the music on their houseboat weekend (even though I'd emailed everyone two months earlier telling them the must go!).

We were also stopped by one of the band members (the guy in the red bucket hat) on our way out, asked to sign the mailing list (that I had already done) and asked what we were up to now. Our sad result, being Canberra, was that we were heading home (after somone pulled the shifty and asked him where THEY would be going). I'm just that sad that I don't know good places to go hang out with awesome bands!

The final 'highlight' of the night was returning to the food van that I last visited about 5 years ago. I have a friend who lives in Chifley, and each time we went out to civic (ie, once or twice a week) we'd stop at Marty's food van - at that stage located in the servo on the main road. I would typically order a steak burger with just lettuce and bacon (no sauce) or hot chips (no gravy), and always one of those dirty foodvan dimsims. So I was a bit shocked when I went up to order for middle bro (my shout for him driving) and marty replied with 'and a dimsim?!'. I had to explain that I was vegan now (hence why I couldn't get my usual chips fried in the oil with nuggets and scallops) so I wouldn't need one. 5 years is a long time between orders!

Final word - if you haven't heard them after all this time of me raving about them, PLEASE at least check out their MySpace or look them up in YouTube or here and have a listen to one of my top five bands of all time.