Courtney Barnett - Chaos on the Pedestal
Only a handful of new artists have emerged in the last couple of years that you imagine will still be around in 15 years time. Courtney Barnett is one and as Avant Gardener and History Eraser were released to critical acclaim on EP’s in 2013, she quickly followed this up with her first full album that is ‘Sometimes I sit and think, Sometimes I just sit’ a mission statement if you like for the slacker generation, and its packed full of angst anthems about everyday mundanity.
Barnett arrives on stage to a heaving Kentish Forum, the first of 2 sold out nights and she’s dressed to unimpress, black jeans and a white T shirt that says ‘Choose Love’ in big bold black ‘Frankie says’ style. Hair dishevelled and hiding her eyes that have a wistful distant hazy look, and you wonder if she is actually in the room at all. She puts that right in a second as we get a rendition of ‘Avant Gardener’ quickly followed by a thumping version of ‘Dead Fox’ with its upbeat chorus of “If you can’t see me, I can’t see you” which has crowd and band bouncing in unison.
Courtney Barnett is a 3 piece and you shouldn’t underestimate the contributions from her fellow bandmates Andrew ‘Bones’ Sloane on bass, backing vocals and hair, and Dave Mudie on drums and stylish hats. They keep catlike Courtney in check with their careful chaos of rhythm and time.
There is a screen at the back of the band and psychedelic imagery is projected throughout the set, its like ‘LSD vision cam’, sometimes cartoon figures with dinosaurs, campervans and swimming scenes, then it all goes patterned and swirling, then the same image but just slightly distorted, duplicated and then in 3d, everyone is having a trip tonight – and even the designated driver can join in. Combine this with Kentish Forum’s massive glitterball which gets an early pre xmas run out, and every now and then it peppers the balcony with stars and the whole room is spinning (this reviewer is definitely sober!).
At times particularly mid set they drift away into a druggy psychogrunge that loses the audience temporarily to the bar or phones, but very quickly she comes back with ‘Elevator Operator’ and its one two beat clapathon. If boredom sets in, Barnett just hits her guitar pedal that must be marked ‘melt faces’ and unleashes an overdrive fuzz sound that has back teeth rattling in the balcony. Such is the contrast of style that it never really gets boring, you just don’t know what’s coming next.
Its quite difficult to pinpoint Barnett’s style but if you imagine a cross between arctic monkeys/the fall/elastica with Chrissie Hynde’s styling and Sheryl Crow’s country/folk/blues fusion you wouldn’t be far wrong. Her lyrics require more than one listening to appreciate the talkie sing stories that she has developed, take the opening 2 lines of ‘Dead Fox’ as an example “Jen insists that we buy organic vegetables, and I must admit that I was a little skeptical at first, a little pesticide can't hurt. Never having too much money, I get the cheap stuff at the supermarket, but they're all pumped up with shit, a friend told me that they stick nicotine in the apples…” and so it goes on.
And it’s impossible to singalong to anything but the chorus of ‘Pedestrian at Best’ even if you know the words “I want to wash out my head with turpentine cyanide I dislike this internal diatribe when I try to catch your eye I hate seeing you crying in the kitchen I don't know why it makes me like this when you're not even mine to consider erroneous harmonious I'm hardly sanctimonious” all this sung without taking a breath, instead we can only dutifully come in with “Put me on a Pedestal and I’ll only disappoint you”.
This brings the set to a close and the encore has fellow Melbourne based support band ‘Big Scary’ on stage with Barnett to run through a cover of ‘Know your product’ originally by another Aussie band The Saints. Second encore is more predictably History Eraser, making those two older tracks the bookends of a fantastic show.
Courtney Barnett is now high on that pedestal, but she does not disappoint, and her show is equal parts angst, lush pop harmonies, psychadelia and chaos. The live set takes a big swerve from the album production, and whilst some might feel uncomfortable about the lack of shine and replication, its very live, refreshing, raucous fun and uncompromisingly chaotic.
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