The 1975
Aware Super Theatre, Sydney
16.04.23
The 1975 continued their takeover of Australia in style in Sydney this weekend.
In a similar way to their exalted predecessors like The Cure and The Smiths, The 1975 have become remarkably adept at maintaining the ‘Happy Sad’ sensibility of their youthful generation.
And in a similar fashion to the frontmen of those aforementioned iconic indie outfits, Matty Healy is no stranger to embodying the anti-hero: his theatricality on stage, oftentimes presented as an ill-advised stream of consciousness (who can forget when his band undercut one of his tiresome tirades by playing the next song?), can rub some people up the wrong way, but those who have been following The 1975’s movements on their world tour know the truth is different.
An audience comprised mainly of those who grew up on the Tumblr-driven fandom of their self-titled debut album and 2016’s acclaimed A Brief Inquiry into Online Relationships were immediately captivated when a solo Healy first took to the stage to offer an acoustic rendition of “Be My Mistake”.
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Those who had joined the fandom in more recent times, though, through the band’s TikTok resurgence or otherwise, didn’t have to wait very long at all until recent hits like “I’m in Love With You” kicked things into full swing.
Employing an alternate camera from “Part of the Band” onwards, Healy’s face was projected in extreme detail which only furthered the bond between band and audience.
Healy’s typical penchant for brashness soon had him breaking up a fight in the mosh pit mid-set, as well as confronting drummer and long-term collaborator George Daniel about wreaking havoc on the print out of the set list (Daniel had “replaced every noun” for another very naughty word).
As predicted, the crowd ate every last morsel of the performance up. And while the tour itself was celebrating The 1975’s latest studio album ‘Being Funny in a Foreign Language, the set list surprisingly boasted very few tracks from it. Perhaps they played it safe; maybe they knew what the fans really wanted to hear; not many bands would be so accommodating at a live show.
The overall vibe of the night was summed up when the band singled out all the “millennials in the house” during a fun cover of the Backstreet Boys’s “I Want It That Way”. The 1975’s concert in Sydney was a nostalgic and consoling march down memory lane with Healy firmly at the helm.
The 1975’s Australian tour now heads to New Zealand for shows in Wellington and Auckland. Ticket information is available here.
