Anne WidjajaVerdict: The Wombats @ The Enmore
August 11th 2008 14:27
If your deep, indie snobbery cannot bear the thought of taking a band named after a slow moving marsupial seriously than ha! that's exactly what they wanted, so go wear some ray bans and poke out the lenses to redeem your I-am-the-original-scenester sense of self. It's rare that the critics actually praise a pop band whose emotional depth is at it's height in a song about falling in love with a stripper, so I'm going to jump right on the band wagon and say: The Wombats are the greatest thing to happen to indie pop. In the midst of an increasingly image obsessed music scene, it is refreshing to see a successful band that don't take themselves too seriously (on their website a journalist describes them as a joke that they didn't anyone to find funny).Observe: the average indie/rock band looks as if they just walked off the set of Micheal Jackson's Thriller video, yet they are so 'cool' and 'unaffected' that they enter the stage in a manner not unlike an entrance into the local 7/11. But then three seconds later their egos grow to an unfathomable size and with much Rocky Balboa-esque air punching they start to leap around the stage equipment - to the horror of the techies - encouraging the screaming crowd to let their lungs practically fall out of their mouths before they even consider picking up their instruments. The Wombats on the other hand saunter on stage to Queen's Bicycle, wearing all the colours you would find in an exciting crayon box, politely wave to the crowd and assume their positions.Their demeanor is epitomized in the way frontman Matthew Murphy rock pops it out on a baby blue guitar covered in tiny flowers. They are a genuinely weird trio of Liverpudlian kids who derived their band name from 'wombo the wombat', a fictional character who they made up and referred to in daily conversations. Odd they may be, but it all adds to the fact that they're unbelievably, not even cringe worthily, fun.
After an exhausting list of tour dates and with a relatively small one album repertoire the band have become a well oiled live gigging machine,playing out every repeated bridge of harmonised oohs and ahhs to the delight of their predominately female, hook hungry crowd. Opening with the first single Kill the Director,they extend the beginning bars of the song just to send the crowd overthe edge with anticipation (not that they needed it). And as soon as those first lyrics are sing-spoken by Murphy, the first rows in the standing area begin to pulsate with ecstatic energy. 'This is no Bridget Jones' is left to the audience to sing, well rather shout, with surprisingly aggressive conviction after Murphy himself is drowned out. The band seamlessly rip through each song from their debut album A Guide to Love, Loss and Desperation to perfection; every note, every guitar riff, every chorus is spot on.But just to keep things interesting the set is cohesively bridged together by a jam consisting of a couple of notes from the end of songs, building up the 'ooh what song are they playing now' excitement.Just when I thought I would get a moment to breath for the only 'quiet' moment on the album Here Comes the Anxiety, the crowd, visibly beginning to tire after all the relentless bopping, relays the lyrics with enthusiasm and swaying hand action that matches the reception of the faster songs, crooning lyrics 'I think I'll just be honest' and later Little Miss Pipe dream's 'I'd cheat a priest just to get to you' with an empathy for Murphy's lyrics that are the key to The Wombats popularity.
Catchy lyrics that aren't drawled or mumbled, catchy hooks and riffs, fast paced cymbal heavy drum beats and a family friendly sing along line in every song, are a perfect formula for digestible guitar pop in its purest form. The highlight of the evening, Let's Dance to Joy Division invokes a literal meaning to the phrase 'jumping beans' as the crowd attempts to jump/dance/jig/whatever around in time to the frenetically paced drums and guitar riffs, yelling every lyric louder and louder with the increasing deafness of each punter. And just as you think the band couldn't be any more likable, between songs Murphy mentions the 'Harold Bishop Appreciation Society' (about three times) and sports a giant green and gold sombrero during the show, until he looks like he is about to drown in his own sweat. The epic closer, My First Wedding brings out the angry, jealous ex in everyone in the crowd especially with the chorus 'She's not that beautiful!' yelled back at the band like a mantra for the first wive's club. The Wombats certainly are the little band that could...and judging from the new song they previewed (only ever officially played live for the 3rdtime) the best is yet to come.
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