MOVING PICTURES, Perth, 22 Nov, 2015

Shane | 1 December 2015 | Reply

LIVE: JAMES REYNE/ THE WHITLAMS/ MARK SEYMOUR/ DIESEL/ MOVING PICTURES, Perth, 22 Nov, 2015
A DAY ON THE GREEN – Kings Park, Perth – Sunday, 22 November, 2015
Reviewed by Shane Pinnegar
Photography by Maree King

It’s not really Spring until the Day On The Green shows start filling our calendar and Kings Park fills up with wine-sipping music fans of a certain age, and it was a fittingly glorious day for JAMES REYNE to be revisiting his Australian Crawl surfer anthems.

MOVING PICTURES may have only made two albums, but their biggest hit What About Me remains a stone cold classic. Singer Alex Smith wrings every ounce of emotion from the song in the afternoon sun, helping us all to forget Shannon Noll’s one dimensional cover of a few years back, and rounded their set out with a tremendous Bustin’ Loose and covers from their new album including The Boss’s Born to Run.

[Show picture list]

It’s a long way from his days at Scarborough High School for DIESEL, aka Mark Lizotte, but there’s no looking back from the dapperly attired guitarist as he & his power trio shreds through a handful of hits and a handful of guitars. The soulful blues rock of Man Alive, Tip Of My Tongue and Come To Me sit comfortably next to the bluesier pub rock of Soul Revival and Don’t Need Love from his Injectors days and he makes a strong claim for most dynamic performer of the day.

Hunters & Collectors frontman MARK SEYMOUR is here with his band The Undertow to deliver a fine set of folk-tinged rock tunes, including Football Train, FIFO and Westgate, each one telling a story in the finest singer/songwriter tradition. Softly spoken and humble, he politely turns one punter down when they cry out for Holy Grail, explaining that the Reclaim Australia buffoons used it at a rally yesterday so he was boycotting the song in protest of their thinly veiled racism. Hunters favourites When The River Runs Dry and Throw Your Arms Around Me more than made up for it’s omission and Seymour won new fans with his moral stand.

THE WHITLAMS’ piano-led quirky pop stood out on the day, and perhaps would have better suited earlier in the afternoon. Whilst No Aphrodisiac and I Make Hamburgers are popular enough, the rest of their set lacked the energy of the other acts on the line-up, and attentions wandered.

JAMES REYNE may not have Seymour’s humbleness, nor Diesel’s conviviality and rock cred – in fact, at times he seems positively aloof – even arrogant. But even he melted and shared a few smiles and quips with the fans as their approval was so readily given in honour of his killer back catalogue, especially since re-embracing his days as Australian Crawl frontman. Mixing up that band’s biggest and best with his many solo hits proved a winning combination with quintessentially Australian songs Beautiful People, Errol, Oh No Not You Again, Boys Light Up, Reckless, Hammerhead, Way Out West, Motor’s Too Fast and Fall Of Rome keeping the Kings Park crowd singing and dancing late into the night.