Although World Cup soccer prevented me from arriving early enough to catch any of The Nation Blue, I did arrive in time to catch New York 4 piece Girls Against Boys. About half of this high energy set incorporated two bass players obliging their band mates on a seemingly undersized SJ's stage. The remainder of the set saw one of them doing their utmost to simply trash his keyboard.....no damage to report.

There was minimal banter between songs from the band, but near the end of the set singer / guitarist Scott McCloud lamented his appreciation to the crowd : "Thank you very much. This is our first time in Australia, it's fuckin good here man! We thank Magic Dirt for bringing us down here - and thank you for checking it out" .

Girls Against Boys setlist: In Like Flynn, Cruise Yourself, All The Rage, BFF, Kill The Sexplayer, Basstation, Learned It, Bullet Proof Cupid, The Come Down, Super-Fire, Let Me Come Back.

By the time Magic Dirt impacted the stage, the room was a buzz and at near full capacity. Rockstars started off the 12 song, 70 minute set. The band were in fine form, pulling out the big rock moves that we know and love from them from the outset. The energy shown early on in the set was intense. The band then treated their long-standing loyal fans to a blistering version of Ice, an old fave from their 1994 EP "Life Was Better". Adalita then addressed the overly enthused Novacastrian crowd musing "Thanks Newcastle. Fuck it's hot. It's good to be back at SJs, the Mad Cow Cafe."

The band then played a big crowd favourite, Competition Girl. The girls behind the bar started their own little mosh pit, and Adalita praised the girls efforts during the extended bridge of the song.

Magic Dirt seem to have struck up a good friendship with the lads from Boys Against Girls, enough so to dedicate Sparrow to them - "Thanks to Girls Against Boys for playing tonight - did ya fuckin' enjoy that? This one's for them - we love them..."

During Dirty Jeans, Adalita encountered some technical problems & had to move away from the mic for a few bars. However the song kept going and the crowd filled the vocal void in unison.

The band then entered the stand up comedy routine of the evening. They started off telling us how good Karaoke is - "Does anyone here get into Karaoke? It's the best! 'Cause we just went to Tokyo & we did some Karaoke... It's the best man, just get off your head, go to karaoke and grab the mic and turn up the echo - it's fuckin insane, you'll just have the best time." & then the big show stopper - "Dean has confessed he's gonna kill himself tonight on stage - that'll be a one off won't it!"

Magic Dirt road tested a couple of new songs on the night, the first being a gentle, rocking number titled All My Crushes. The other new song performed on the night was called Last Night - this track came across as a strong live song, the crowd really lapped it up.

The final song of the night was a 10 minute epic version of She-Riff. It started not dissimilar to how it would end, in an array of high pitch noises and feedback. The final crescendo was ear splitting, I noticed a few punters felt compelled to block their ears. Perhaps a little self indulgent with the feedback, but the show was a true rock spectacle. The main disappointment - no encore.

Magic Dirt Setlist: Rockstars, Ice, Competition Girl, Sparrow, Dirty Jeans, He-Man, All My Crushes, Amoxycillin, Pace It, Baby Cakes, Last Night, She-Riff.


Review by Paul Stipack
All photo's © Brendan Worth