Part 52 – Washington and Animals

It was warm night, an even before the band room at the Toff was full, the air was stuffy, and a little lethargic. Credit card, arm stamped, bar for beer.

Rat Vs. Possum. A terribly bad name. They opened with a (mostly) keyboard, drone/noise with drums intro to their first track. The build up was pretty good, and probably would have been a lot better if the sound techs had done a better job. After the indulgent 2 or 3 minutes, the track kicked in. It was fun. Really fun. Their songs sounded like Animal Collective/Octopus Project sounding, synth infused, poppy yet slightly inaccessible art-wank songs. Things heated up when the played a (more) melodic cover of My Disco’s You Came To Me Like A Cancer Lain Dormant Until It Blossomed Like A Rose, which I love.

The audience however, were not interested, and sat in a dormant like state until the very last song, when they decide to rise on their haunches in anticipation for the main act.

Washington emerged from the curtains with her band and very quickly leapt into her music. Her songs were mostly catchy, poppy and sweet, and were enjoyable. Most songs however were backed up my her band – their music was boring. It felt like they had to write in the ‘band music’ to add a more poppy, friendly feel to her music (possibly). It didn’t work. I am not critising the band, they were fine, but it didn’t work. It was dull and predictable.

The best part of her show was at the end of another guitar-boring song where she finished by slowly moving away from the microphone as she repeated the last line again and again and again. In this 20 seconds, we got to experience her wonderful vocal range without the encumbrance of a loud, boring band. I am not crapping on the members of the band either – the “band” music was just dull, boring and so predictable.

Washington did not have enough material for a whole show. So much of the second half’s songs were carbon copies of each other. Overall, her gig was disappointing. She seemed to be enjoying herself, which was nice, but the show was, at best, mostly dull.

The show changed at the half way point however. It seems that she doesn’t have enough good material to play a full gig. Most of the songs in the second half felt like fillers, and the band was not working in her favour.
Overall, Washington was disappointing.