Julian Casablancas - The Tivoli (May 6)

12 May 2010 by Richard Wilson

The Strokes' Julian Casablancas kicked off his short Australian tour in support of his first solo album at Brisbane's Tivoli.

Opening the night was Brisbane rock band The Cairos. The solid four-piece played a mix of indie rock that caught the attention of the few hundred that were at The Tivoli in time to catch their short set, building a noticeable energy in the crowd on this Thursday night.

After an unusually long break between bands that saw a lot of the energy built by The Cairos dissipate -- another support band probably wouldn't have gone astray -- Julian Casablancas appeared and hit the ground running, backed by a band that were able to breathe life into the synthetic orchestration of his debut solo album 'Phrazes for the Young'. Solo is of course a misnomer that seeks only to distance this project from his work with The Strokes. You won't see Casablancas pick up the acoustic guitar -- or any instrument for that matter -- with a five-piece band faithfully recreating the cavalcade of trebles that dominate 'Phrazes'.

Used to great effect on 'Phrazes', Casablancas' technique of slow vocals over manically fast drums and guitars is utilised throughout the show with varying results. Sometimes it meshed, but more often than not the sound was too disjointed and out of sync.

With only one solo album to his name, the evening was a short affair. A few Strokes 'covers' were thrown in,  appropriately re-imagined into upbeat electro-friendly numbers that pleased the many Strokes aficionados in the crowd, and gave the audience a taste of The Strokes' upcoming Splendour appearance -- looking around the room at The Tivoli, it's hard to imagine that many in the young indie crowd weren't among the thousands endlessly refreshing their browser to try and score the illusive Splendour ticket.

In the end, it really was just a taste. Casablancas hasn't fleshed his short eight-song, 40 minute album into a full concert experience, and with a handful of Strokes songs thrown in the set crept in at a bit over an hour with an encore. When the house lights came on, some headed for the doors but many stood in disbelief at the brevity. Generally speaking, house lights means game over, but at $70 a piece, plenty in the crowd weren't leaving without giving it a shot, chanting for several minutes until being rewarded with a second encore by way of "4 Chords of the Apocalypse". Those on their way out quickly changed direction and the show went on for five more minutes.

To his credit, despite the shortness, Julian Casablancas was engaging throughout with the crowd, with plenty of back-and-forth with hecklers and song-requesters alike, and there certainly wasn't a dull moment. He did seem genuinely stunned that the crowd was wild enough to demand a show longer than 60 minutes. And a note to rock stars out there: thank the support band or don't thank the support band. They're normally just stoked to be sharing a stage with you. But if you do thank them, don't trust your memory and write their name down on the setlist. Julian thanked the "local band" before being prompted by band members to the point where he was almost there with "Cairo", singing them praises that seemed almost genuine enough to believe he was in the building while they played. At least he got the city name right, though that probably was written on the setlist.

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