Birds of Tokyo with Soft White Machine, and The Gallant @ The Zoo, Fortitude Valley (04/10/07)

All bands, in particular local bands, need to heed this warning:
“Don’t trust The Zoo sound techs with your music. Provide your own tried, tested and trusted sound techs. Please. For your sake and ours.”

The Gallant

The Gallant was a band that I had never even heard of, although they did seem to have quite a few fans in the small early crowd. Unfortunately the sound was terrible. However like a lot of new alternative rock bands they focus too much on the instrumental side. Producing a hard hitting rock sound and not paying a great deal of attention to their vocals. I can see how some of the Birds of Tokyo fans may have appreciated this music. However I am not one of them. I doubt I will seek The Gallant out again. In fact if they were to a support at a future gig it would give me a good reason to turn up late. The sound was just woeful, even for The Zoo’s standard.

Performance 5.5
Technical 3


Soft White Machine

Soft White Machine was only a mild improvement on The Gallant. The vocals were slightly better, from what I could hear anyway, the sound mixing was appalling. Soft White Machine is everything but soft, they describe themselves as progressive rock, I would go further and say that they are progressive hard rock. A couple of Soft White Machine’s songs have potential. Soft White Machine was only able to hold my attention for a couple of songs. I just don’t think this kind of music is my thing.

Performance 5.5
Technical 4


Birds of Tokyo

The crowd has grown dramatically and has tightly gathered in front of the stage for the arrival of Birds of Tokyo, and remains tightly packed for the first few songs. Before the heat of an un-air-conditioned Zoo becomes too much and the crowd spreads outs. The biggest disappointment for me again was the sound. The mixing was dreadful and it was far too loud. A huge part of the Birds of Tokyo’s sound is Ian Kenny’s fantastic vocals, which you couldn’t hear due to the incompetent mixing. Typical highlights were Wayside, Off Kilter, Minor War and my personal favourite which they opened with Black Sheets. Birds of Tokyo seem to have a harder sound live (although this gig is not the best to judge that). Birds of Tokyo look really good on stage and the crowd respond accordingly (I didn’t expect such a hardcore crowd). All I can hope is that when these guys return they either play a decent venue or ensure someone they can trust is on sound.

Performance 6.5
Technical 2.5