Heading towards the Big Top at Moore Park, Sydney it was evident by the amount of vintage Cold Chisel T-shirts being worn by the flock of fans heading to the old Showgrounds as to what on this evening.
This first act on was Karen Lee Andrews with an acoustic guitar, stomp box and vocals. She gave a good solid performance and received a good reaction from the small crowd that had arrived by then.
Next up were The Cruel Sea, who hit the stage with their classic 90s groove.
A larger crowd was starting to form by now and were reacting very favourably to the band.
The four original members (Tex Perkins – vocals, Dan Rumour – guitar, Ken Gormley – bass, Jim Elliot – Drums) were joined by the more than capable Matt Walker on acoustic guitar and keys. The acoustic guitar worked surprisingly well with their songs.
Interesting The Cruel Sea started out as an instrumental band before Tex joined. Cruel Sea is the name of an instrumental song by The Dakotas from the early 60s.
Cold Chisel hit the stage running and by the second song the crowd were on their feet, even the late comers who were very annoying, not only arriving late but shining their phone torches looking for seat numbers and generally being noisy and a nuisance. And then there were the required selfies and holding their phones up above their heads ‘filming’ – blocking the people behind themselves’ sight to stage.
Charlie Drayton, on drums has found his spot in the band, and has settled in well.
The crowed sang along to the songs that they knew – which was nearly all of them.
Chisel added a guitar solo to Ke San which confused the crowd as it was different to the recorded version that they were very familiar with. The crowd sang right over it.
I also noticed that some songs were dropped in pitch, probably to accommodate the vocals and make them easier to sing.
CODA
All in all it was a great show with Chisel proving their place in Australian rock history. Who knows how many more opportunities we’ll have to see bands from this classic era? See them while you still can, it’s well worth it.
Cold Chisel is:
Jimmy Barnes – Vocals
Ian Moss – Guitars & Vocal
Steve Prestwich – Drums (RIP 2011)
Phil Small – Bass
Don Walker – Piano & Organ
Charley Drayton – Drums (since 2011)