It was a cloudy but somewhat warm Saturday afternoon when Shelvo and I returned to The Triffid like a particularly well-crafted pair of boomerangs for a showdown on Stratton Street. Live music and motorcycles met once again in a union of roaring noise and shiny steel for the fifth round of The Showdown, Brisbane and Gold Coast’s premier chopper festival. We are a music magazine so you’ll have to forgive our ignorance about motorcycles, but I will say that all the bikes were works of art and clearly had a lot of love and care put into them to get them show ready.
They were on display across the beer garden and the band room, with the mezzanine taken over by the good folks at Old Soul Tattoo, who turned it into their temporary studio for the day. Starting out the day in the beer garden were a Salute to Johnny Cash, a cover band playing all the hits from the Man in Black himself.
Up next were the first original band for the day, Dopamine, who definitely had the hardest job of all the bands on the line-up. With the beer garden full of bikes and stalls, there wasn’t much room in front of the stage so everyone had to watch them from a distance, but the band took it in stride. “We’ve never played to a room of Harley Davidson reps before!” quipped their frontman Finley Miller.
They play fairly bright sounding indie rock, which means they “sound like everyone else” according to Finely, who’s full of great bits of stage banter. They should give themselves some more credit but, I’ve seen them a couple of times before and I rate them.
After Dopamine finished, the awards ceremony for the bikes followed soon after. Taking out the Best in Show was Joel Warney, with a bike frame that he quite literally made with his own two hands. The Hypnic Jerk Pick of the Litter award is quite a coveted one, voted on by one of the biggest custom builders in the country and was won by Jesse Pearce. Iron and Resin Garage where the Gold Coast Showdowns are held have their own award, which was taken out by Jerk Methica. Brett Hulley won Best Paint and I have to agree that the flames on his bike were red hot. The attendees themselves awarded Sam Wilson the People’s Choice award.
There were a few awards that were a bit more out of left field as well. Isaac Revival won the award for Best Deathtrap, for the best looking but also equivalently dangerous to ride bike at the show. The band Scarnon and some of their team from Open Road MCSC rode up all the way from Melbourne to attend The Showdown and were duly awarded the award for Furthest Ridden. With a distance like that they might as well have had their instruments delivered up so they could play the show!
Once the awards were done, it was already heading into the evening and it became clear who was here for the bikes and who was here for the music. A lot of the attendees were clearly friends or colleagues of the chopper builders and probably didn’t know much about the line-up save for perhaps Rinser who’ve played these events before. A couple of bikes rumbled off down Stratton Street and into the night, but if you knew how to party then you were sticking around. Some of the bikes in the band room were moved away to make room for the audience and the main stage was ready to rock and roll.
Gold Coast lads Rinser were first up on the main stage. Having done The Showdown already, they knew what to expect and were definitely the most relaxed band in-between songs. I’ve listened to them before and seen them in passing but this is the first time I’ve managed to catch a full set. Like many of the bands that I’ve been listening to lately, they’re definitely partial to a bit of Sabbath worship.
They’re a heavy psych four piece with a hefty old school doom influence, especially in the vocals. The songs move at a fairly chill pace with some occasional faster passages to mix things up. They’ve got some great riffs that have that driving, bluesy sound that I froth. They’re even nice enough to dedicate Son of a Rising Sun to our very own Shelvo, or rather all veterans, with frontman Charlie Seymour-Grant telling us all that he wrote it about his father who served.
Following on were Byron Bay boys Mudwagon, who are very much cut from the same cloth but fall on the opposite side of the stoner rock coin. They’re definitely more about the psychedelia, with plenty of dynamic shifts in both speed and noise throughout their songs. It’s obvious from the jump that they’re very keen to party and make a good impression. Frontman Damo Town struts around on stage with no shoes or shirt while serving up fuzz drenched riffs to the crowd. He keeps dropping his pick and disconnecting the lead to his guitar in his zeal but this doesn’t slow him down at all.
While I was off seeing Mudwagon, Shelvo managed to catch Mike Hamilton in the Beer Garden. Here’s what he had to say:
Rinser’s passionate performance of Son of a Rising Sun left me a bit lumpy throated, misty eyed, and reflective of my own military service. This edged me toward the beer garden to absorb the acoustic Southern Delta sounds of Mike Hamilton and his band.
Mike’s tender crooning helped me gathered my thoughts. I sat there sharing the moment with Jorge from Fast Johnny and The Slow Burners, tranquility brushing over the gathered crowd. It was perfect. Mike eased and entertained with mouth harp, accompanied by percussion from George’s producer Ant Vallone and my new mate Mungo on bass from The Sleeves and Datura. We met the night before at the 1800Mikey gig, with Mikey and his band also in attendance at The Showdown. I was informed that Mungo’s pristine 1970’s Mapleglo Rickenbacker 4003 came into his life courtesy of a Gold Coast Cash Converters store bargain, and he made it sing in a style fitting to accompany Mike’s own. Granite and the Evergreens and Cryin’ Over You have now been added to my playlist, as I’ve definitely fallen under Mike’s spell.
The most unique band on the line-up were our mates Fat Dog and The Tits, an experimental punk seven-piece with members now spread across the SEQ coast. With keyboards and a clarinet added to the typical five-piece formula, they always cut a distinctive figure on stage, mostly because it’s hard to fit all of them on sometimes! This time round, they decided to go all out with the visual spectacle, dressing up in different colored boiler suits, clearly taking a page out of the DEVO playbook. Some of the audience members were confused as to what to expect from this septet of cosmic yobs but once they stated playing, they made quick fans of the crowd.
Frontwoman Sam AKA Fat Dog was a whirlwind of energy on stage like usual, she dances around in a style that’s as unpredictable as the music is. Her talky, very ocker vocals are almost sultry during some songs, loud and hoarse during others, and are always unmistakably her.
Workwear is usually meant to withstand a lot of wear and tear but every time I’ve seen it worn on stage, someone always ends up splitting their pants. Last time it was Benny from Bad Dreems and this time it’s Sam who suffers from this misfortune, which she announces to the crowd with a resigned laugh.
In contrast, clarinetist Keisha is having much better luck this time round. Most of the time having a woodwind instrument in a venue meant for loud touring acts means that you can’t hear it too well because it has to be played into a mic that doesn’t quite capture all the grunt. But tonight, she’s got a new mic that plugs right into the clarinet and lets you hear every croon and wail. Having seen them a few times before, I do feel like it’s the last piece of the puzzle and truly let’s all members of the band rock out.
Fat Dog and The Tits are unquestionably a punk band but their songs aren’t quite the fast buzzsaw stuff that a lot of people are used to. They’re a bit more mid-tempo, shifting from loud to soft and back again at a moment’s notice, and reveling in discordance. That said, they’re still brash and full of energy, both from a songwriting perspective and as a live act. In particular, Junkie Witch gets the so far fairly tame crowd moving and grooving. They only play for half an hour, leaving a few crowd members disappointed because they were just starting to get into it.
The next band on however had the eager crowd members well covered. Granted there are five of them, but they may be the only band who could out drink DZ Deathrays, out smoke Dune Rats, and engage in more high-risk behaviour than The Chats and Private Function combined. I am of course talking about rising local troublemakers, Dad Fight.
Frontman Buddy was unfortunately in absentia because he’s a [redacted] [redacted] and instead spent his time in Scotland trying to film a one-man reenactment of Braveheart. Stepping up to the microphone this time was their bassist, Jack, with bass duties fulfilled by a local Rey Mysterio impersonator. Unfortunately, he was robbed of his costume and guitar strap before the show, and had to take to the stage wearing a red, crocheted ski mask along with a matching pair of boxers. A local mechanic was kind enough to lend him a length of chain to hold his bass up and with that, Dad Fight were ready to rumble.
The band came roaring out onto stage with all their typical bravado as they launched into the opening chords of Can’t See Straight. They then ripped through many of the crowd favourites with Jack easily proving his mettle as a vocalist, which is especially impressive considering this was his first time singing a whole set. Being well aware of the demographic of the festival, they threw in a cover of Motorhead’s Ace of Spades, which is apparently what they imagine motorcyclists hear in their heads when they go for a ride. They were goddamn right!
The crowd absolutely loved it but things were still too tame for Dad Fight’s liking. They then played the as yet unreleased song Mosh and incited the crowd to do just that. I needed little further encouragement and neither did anyone else. The Triffid floor was soon awash with spilled beer and tumbling bodies as the first pit of the night opened up. Dad Fight typically feed off the energy of the crowd (and occasionally feed the crowd insults and sprays of beer) and this time was no different, with Jack jumping right into the fray and joining us all in the controlled violence.
What was different this time is how they decided to quite literally feed the crowd. Dad Fight were concerned that many of the attendees were malnourished after subsisting on a diet of shall we say… high octane fuel and beer for much of their lives. To this end, they brought their mate Tim out to cook up some freshly made pizzas with one of those nifty electric pizza ovens.
They handed slices out personally to punters, which were all accepted with gratitude. I’ve seen Private Function hand out the world’s hottest corn chips to people before but that just ended up fucking everyone up. Dad Fight actually had the crowd eating out of the palms of their hands. Don’t ever say that this band doesn’t give back to the community!
Dad Fight ended their thunderous set with their first single, Ned Kelly, a tribute to one of Australia’s most controversial yet pervasive historical figures. Right before they were due to start, their bassist ripped off his mask to reveal that he was none other than Jamaal from PVCKER UP the whole time! Easily one of the top ten most iconic identity reveals out there.
After the Dad Fight set, the world’s dodgiest raffle was held. Because most of the attendees had already left and a lot of people made an exodus to the beer garden, only a few of the entrants properly won anything. The rest were all given out through re-draws or at random after they couldn’t find a suitable entrant. If you left early but are also somehow still reading this, you might have missed out!
Capping off the festivities were some new mates of ours who came up all the way up from the frigid wastes of Victoria, Melbourne’s very own Drunk Mums. Coming off the release of their latest album New Australia, the Drunkies are a revitalized force, and played a mixed set of new bangers and old favorites.
They started things out rather appropriately with I’ve Got a Motorbike So Fuck You, making them the only band on the line-up that night who actually had song about them. This endeared them to the crowd, but not nearly as much as their cover of Steppenwolf’s Born to Be Wild, which the crowd loved even more than Ace of Spades. They tried to play one of their old fan favourites Mutant afterwards to keep the energy high but their guitarist Jake thought they were in the same key as the cover, so they had to abandon it mid-song after a few false starts.
“Play one that you actually know!” cried one of crowd members as the band tried to figure out what to play next. Speaking of the crowd, it was less compacted than Dad Fight but easily just as rowdy if not more so. Their other guitarist Dean had been at his brother’s bucks party and the party decided to come to The Showdown. Already beyond intoxicated after at least twenty-four hours of drinking, the party goers leapt straight into the fray once they were pointed out by Dean.
I think it was meant to be some sort of dress up party because Dean’s brother was in a glittery golden dress and someone brought a Pokémon plush that ended up being thrown around the mosh. Other members of their party were dressed in normal but nice clothes, that were quickly drenched in beer and sweat.
I’ve never seen so many women (and men come to think of it) mosh in high heels before but Dean’s family and friends are just as punk as he is and didn’t write themselves off despite the treacherously slippery floor. Other members of the crowd decided that this was a good time to practice for the Brisbane Olympics hammer throw event and began hurling each other into the air. That’s not a figure of speech. The Mudwagon boys, who were also off their heads, decided to join in as well and soon it was beyond chaos.
There were some pretty brutal hits but ironically it was Shelvo who wasn’t even moshing who copped one of the worst because his guard wasn’t up:
During Apocalypse, I was accidently poleaxed by the largest dude in the pit as he careened into me, introducing my kidneys and spine to the metal barrier in front of me. Recovering with my surely ruptured spleen, I doubled over in pain as I laughed with the understanding that that’s punk and shit happens. That said, I immediately abandoned my post and sought safety away from the mosh to stand next to our good mate Eamon Sandwith.
The timing was impeccable as Drunkies launched into one of my personal favourites New Australia. Wincing, I said to Eamon, “This is my vote for Hottest 100 song of the year”. Eamon fully pumped up and beaming replied “Yep, mine too!”. His agreement made me feel better, and I am now even more determined to keep mass texting this song request to the Triple J text line to get it there.
Drunkies closed things out with Hot Flush and few people managed to get some extra air time atop the shoulders of their mates, but the seccies weren’t having it. Considering how long the day had been and how slippery the floor was, I can’t really blame them this time round.
Coming to this festival, I wasn’t really expecting things to go how they did. I thought the punters would be fairly frosty if not outright hostile to some of the bands, but I’m glad to say that I was proven wrong in spades. I can count a few moments where I’ve been moved to the brink of happy tears by music in the past year and The Showdown was definitely one of those moments.. You see, I love music but I never thought it’d impact me like that until recently.
I’ve known some of these bands, Dad Fight in particular, for a while now and I’ve witnessed the countless hours of dedication into their art over the years. I’ve watched them go from playing tiny dive bars to absolutely rocking that main stage. To see them up there and get the crowd reaction that they deserve makes me indescribably proud of them. They all knew that it’d probably be an uphill battle to win a lot of the punters over, but they didn’t let that throw them off. This was their time to shine and they absolutely owned it.
Thanks to The Showdown, Amelia (@headnoisefilm), and Sense Music Media (@sensemusicmediaau) for all the photos in this article!
While that’s it for Brisbane this time round, make sure to follow The Showdown (@theshowdown_) for updates on round six to be held on the Gold Coast at Iron and Resin later this year.