Having just been nominated for four of the 2013 WAM awards, Rainy Day Women have quickly become an act to follow. With the success of “Friends”, the band dropped “Ain’t it Time?” back in August and have followed it up with a nationwide tour dedicated to the new single.
These Perth-born boys have been enjoying some Triple J airplay recently, with their summery pop music a happy reminder of the 60s musical zeitgeist.
With a definite Beach Boys influence soaking each melody, the young band exuded a calm presence shaped by their recent successes. Joining them for the Adelaide leg of the tour were hometown acts Kitten Kong and Miss Fellows.
Kitten Kong started off the night, consisting a group of Adelaide-based garage rock/pop musicians. With three guitars spread across the four band members Kitten Kong still lacked a bass guitar, which left an odd gap in their sound. Regardless, the drummer more than made up for the incongruity of the instruments at hand. Driving the tracks with an unrelenting energy, he showed an excellent degree of musicianship while the three guitarists jammed together enthusiastically.
Following on from Kitten Kong were Miss Fellows. With their genre-bending songs, that integrated toned-down psychedelia, folk, blues, indie and rock, Miss Fellows performed pure instrumentals that lead seamlessly into tunes driven by the detailed vocals. Though frontman Zachary Kelty lead these vocals, each performer played a role in building the bluesy harmonies that washed over the quiet psych-rock of the instruments. The artists jammed with a quiet confidence, and interacted comfortably with the attentive gathering below.
Invited to tour with the likes of San Cisco, Big Scary, Ball Park Music, Hungry Kids of Hungary, Loon Lake and The Rubens, along with a number of festival titles to their name, Rainy Day Women have certainly made a name for themselves in the past couple of years.
Taking their title from a Bob Dylan lyric, Rainy Day Women’s live sound was much heavier than the cleanness of their recorded tracks. With the instruments levelling frontman Dylan Ollivierre’s vocals and the drums being a much more prominent element of the music in their recital, Rainy Day Women showed an added dynamism to their sound on Saturday night.
The deliberate gaudiness of the room built on the theatrics of the night, with the sunnily disposed musicians swinging wildly across the thespian-inspired stage. Introducing themselves with the prelude “we’re from Perth and our team lost today”, this Triple J-born outfit had the crowd dancing in seconds with their upbeat single “Friends”.
As the set wore on, the venue began to fill and the dancing punters rapidly multiplied in numbers. The moustachioed quartet seemed to notice, and played off of the energy of the venue, dancing along the stage themselves to “Runaway”, the tongue-in-cheek “Mrs Jones” and “Dancing”. Ending with their breakthrough single “Sleigh Bed”, the band began immediately deconstructing the stage to the disappointment of their happily drunken fans.
Rainy Day Women are undeniably suited to the summer festival style, with their chirpy tunes perfect for a warm sunny day. Though their sound was slightly diminished in the small club venue, these Perth boys are definitely one to see perform for those looking for a feel-good indie band.
