TROUSER TROUSER:

Shortly after we arrived Dennis noticed two well dressed young men in suits sitting in one of the booths having dinner together. He commented on what a cute couple they were, until I told him that they weren't (at least I don't think they are...) - they were half of Trouser Trouser :)

Trouser Trouser played for about an hour, to a fairly good crowd. The music's slightly hard to describe, and hard to find something to compare it to. If Tim Freedman joined You Am I and they covered Radiohead you might get kind of close :) (or you might not...) Their influences were ABBA and the Beatles...

I wasn't hugely impressed with Trouser Trouser. This was the second time I've heard them live (see review of first time) and I thought they might grow on me, but not as yet. The songs were all basically verse, chorus, organ solo and a bit of a jam, chorus, end. Which gets kind of repetitive in an hour long set.

The guitarist and bassist swapped instruments quite a bit, which kept things interesting. The fact that I didn't even pay the slightest bit of attention to who was better on each instrument is an indication of my (lack of) enthusiasm.

That said, they are good at what they do, and if you like the style of music they're definitely worth seeing.

Ooh, they'd just received their first ever royalty cheque, too, and made us guess how much it was for (it was from JJJ for playing Sunday) - $32.50. That's real incentive, eh??

GEORGE:

I hadn't heard George before, or if I had I hadn't realised it was George I was hearing (as it turns out I hadn't heard them before). They are a five-piece from Brisbane, with guitar, bass, drums and a sis and bro combination who share the lead vocals, backing vocals and keyboard duties.

Again the style of music didn't grab me straight away, but I'm prepared to say that it must have been a result of my mood, because it's unusual for me to see three hours of live music and not be enthused. The style varied a fair bit, but it was basically slow (alternative) rock stuff ish. Maybe.

Either way, they are definitely a very talented band. The vocalists are both good, and the songs are very good. (ok, so the descriptive part of my vocabulary has failed me.) They played for about an hour and a half. They were very impressed with the Canberra crowd. They had expected about 10 people, and got around 100-150 at a rough (very rough) estimate. Which, considering it was a Monday night and they are only a little local Brisbane band, was a fair achievement.

They were also stunned by the attention they were getting - absolute silence and anticipation between songs. They reckon they usually play to a room of pissed people who have no idea what's happening. After a 16 song set (yes, we scored setlists) they left the stage, and we clapped and cheered, as you do, waiting for them to do the rock-star thing and return. Then one guy called out "come on, quit fucking around and get back here!!", so they did :)

They were quite stunned by that, too, and thrilled - it's the first encore they've ever played. They did two songs, incl one that went for about 10 minutes at least, which was good and had my full attention. Not usually a hard task for a band, but like I said, for some reason I wasn't really with it that night...

After the show we grabbed the setlists, then waited for them to come out so we could firstly ask if they minded us pinching them, and secondly ask for autographs. Again they were surprised we wanted them :)

So basically George are a very good band, and we promised them we'd be back again when they return in November. For some reason I have a feeling they may remember us :) Apart from my (rather unusual) lack of enthusiasm, they are a pretty impressive band.

And no, I didn't buy the $15 6-track EP. $15!! For 6 tracks!! (they were also quite puzzled when sasha, who didn't score a setlist, asked them to sign again the pre-signed CD, so she could have a personal autograph :) no, we're not groupies, really...

SETLIST:

George: (don't know the trouser trouser one)

encore:

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GST