Squidging our way along a damp Swan Street and into the column cluttered cave that is the Corner Hotel bandroom for an evening with some of Seattle’s great survivors, we were greeted with a haze of reverb.
Scratching gently with the feedback swarming the smoked out stage, The Treatment launched into their support slot with a scarily sharp crack of a snare. The four Sydney lads lashed into their set with a bass driven swagger, flaying their Rickenbackers into banging chord progressions.
Prompting a rise from the knowledgeable heads around the room was going to require more than a little bluff. The sounds wavered between the darker side of Wolf & Cub to a sparse Tumbleweed, and clear links with the main act were forged. They shunted about, all as one before the dreaded mid session lull strained the interest. Be it a need for more material or not, this could have dragged them into a mire of false dawns. However, this fear was cast aside in a trembling whirl that picked up the pace.
No one could have confidently predicted in 1992, that through all of the mind boggling enormity that grunge became twenty years on, we’d be left with a tired Pearl Jam sharing their drummer with a reborn Soundgarden. And Mudhoney.
Frontman Mark Arm flanked by Steve Turner on lead, Guy Maddison on bass and drummer Dan Peters, all still there. It’s almost like someone forgot to send them the memo… all said, Mudhoney are (still) the fucking business.
Crunching through the well worn “No One Has”, the 50-year-old Arm battled against a dim vocal mix to wail over the top. As the bouncing, punkish chords that have served them so well belted through like it was 1988 again. Raw and slinging, lead by the nasal howl that would trigger copycat garage bands for a decade, coursing from the cheek that is the essence of Mudhoney.
The great gloom of “Let It Slide” clattered through as Arm sneered about in a typical non-plussed moan. Turner’s scratchy lead pulled foul, harsh notes across everything as Maddison looked every bit the jolly middle aged bass player, just needing a Hawaiian shirt to top it off (he nods a little and plays bass… that’s his gig. Good for him). Arm’s voice has gravelled but it’s less lazy than before. It’s better.
The racing, furious, ground fucking “Touch Me I’m Sick” burned out any sense that this was a band doing the rounds. When punk broke through on the back of some white boys in Michigan, its sound gave rise to an almighty use of the electric guitar – between Arm and Turner, Mudhoney’s debut single is as blistering as it ever was. The minimalist performance was upsurged by the punching chords – and the jumping flannels approved.
While the sound check evidently didn’t quite achieve its aim, the time for an on stage retune gave way for a Stooges-like hum before the band crashed on as one only to fall away for the most dreary drum solo of all time. Unless there’s a cow on stage banging its own bell, rarely is there any time for a half-arsed drummer boring everyone to death and this was no exception.
“Melbourne winter… Lovely,” Arm proclaimed, speaking for the first time and ditching his guitar to lunge teeth first at the front row, right through the well plucked “This Gift” and “Hard on For War”. Fast finishing, but racing through countless tracks, Maddison called time on the set, giving away the ending “We’ll be back in a minute.”
Thanks. We know.
They came back lashing into the dizzy looseness of “Suck You Dry” and “Blinding Sun”, wrenched like they were brand new from 1993’s Piece Of Cake. There’s almost a jaunty slow-dance to the latter and this wasn’t lost on the swaying masses across the Corner floor.
Stretched to the ominous intro of “Get Into Yours” the offbeat drums of Peters’ battering matched the lunatic cries of ‘I’m losing myself again…’, which brought casual mayhem to the front of stage: all feet in the air and sweaty stumbles.
For all the overblown hype surrounding their contemporaries, maybe it always was little old Mudhoney who knew the score. Frozen in time, yet fresh as a daisy – touch me, I’m sick.
– Ciaran Wilcox
