Laura Jean w/Tom Cooney & Caitlin Park - (7th Aug, The Hopetoun, Sydney)

8 August 2009 by Max Easton

As a part of this month’s feature on Laura Jean, Soulshine went along to the Hopetoun in  Surry Hills to see the Sydney leg of her ‘New Songs’ tour. Supported by Tom Cooney and Caitlin Park, what ensued was a busy night of some of Australia’s finest new and established indie and folk artists as Max Easton writes.

There’s a phenomenon of memory that seems to be at play within the music community. The name Laura Jean, I’m sure for many, is a label which seems extremely familiar, but for a lot of people, it just can’t be placed, or applied to anything specific. If it were possible to convey the sugar-sweet chorus of ‘I’m a Rabbit, I’m a Fox’ (a Triple J favourite only a couple of years ago,) then maybe that would change. Laura Jean is an artist with the utmost amount of talent on her way to large scale recognition, and her live performance certainly supports that.

Set in the confines of Surry Hills’ Hopetoun Hotel, Laura Jean, Brisbane’s Tom Cooney and New South Wales electro-acoustic provocateur Caitlin Park settled in for a night of tunes and back-to-exposed-brick crowds. The Hopetoun is  venue that’s been standing for long enough to have been just as popular in the eighties as it is today, now filled with 7 days a week music and supporting some of Sydney’s finest up-and-coming acts around. It’s a place where you can head on any day of the week and find something fantastic, and Friday night was no different.

Kicking off with Caitlin Park, possessing a loop pedal and an acoustic; in front of a bearded man with a laptop and electric violin, and bordered to her right by a recorder and backing vocals, the night started off with an indie twist. They sample old movie lines, moan in front of a fingerpicked Maton and croon through eerie electro-violin squeals. Caitlin Park is relatively new to the scene, but sure to ride the tide of indie bands soaring through Sydney at the moment.

Caitlin Park is followed by Brisbane’s Tom Cooney, a Soulshine favourite from yesteryear who’s haunting voice and classically inspired electric guitar reintroduce some of the traditional to the Hopetoun which just bore the gorgeous brunt of experimental electro-acoustic indie. His set revolved mostly around newer material and is backed by female vocals complimenting his sombre tunes with fervour.

A short break later and Laura Jean takes the stage with her electric trio; two violins, an accordion and a drum kit. Jean is hard to describe without delving into the cliché; she’s developed a whole band sound over the last few years that progressed from folk to the halfway point that borders indie. If she didn’t predate them, she could be compared to Bridezilla, with a tighter, less punchy tempo. Of course, with the tour riding under the tagline ‘New Songs,’ it was always going to be about debuting tracks and trying them out on a live audience, and it was an absolute treat. For songs so early on in development, the band was impressively onto them with extremely tight backing.

While focusing her set on new tracks, she makes her way through some of her back catalogue, with a great version of ‘Anniversary’ from second album ‘Eden Land.’  The main blight to the evening was the Hopetoun’s longstanding tradition of keeping the TV switched on behind the bar adjacent to the stage. This, of course, divided the audience into three people; those who stood transfixed on the band, those who took furtive, distracted glances at the action behind the bar and those transfixed on the cricket. Sure, everyone loves watching the Pom’s get bowled out for 102, but not all distractions are warranted. That aside, the show went on with witty inter-song banter, finishing with Laura Jean’s first ever stage dive; a 30 centimetre step off the stage. The set finished with the return of Tom Cooney to play electric rhythm guitar on a cover of Neil Young’s superb song ‘Helpless.’ It was a great finish to a very fine set, ending with an enthused sing-a-long before the last call for beer and the subsequent shuffle out of the bar at closing time.

Laura Jean’s music is fantastic, it’s a beautiful blend of the best of several genres and sits within its own pigeonhole which succeeds in being impossible to define. With an absolute abundance of female singer-songwriters at the moment, it’s a tough nut to crack, but her progression from the acoustic based debut album ‘Our Swan Song’ through ‘Eden Land’ and the now exclusively electric new tracks are sure to see her step through that mould and find her niche. Laura Jean is an artist that will be around forever, regardless of where her footing finds her, but with material like what she’s touring across the country at the moment up her sleeve, her footing is sure to get her somewhere cosy.

Be sure to check back on Soulshine for an interview with Laura Jean as a part of our feature artist slot. The ‘New Songs’ tour continues for the next couple of weeks, with further details in the Soulshine Gig Guide.

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