My Blue Heaven

It wasn’t hard, to get the party started..

No, not for The Cat Empire. They have this remarkable ability to be able to rock out the house. A full house at that. You just can’t not get into their music when you see them perform live. You can’t sit down at their gigs… the whole packed out venue (all four floors) were up and hands-in-the-air dancing. There was an amazing vibe and energy at the gig.

Me (Myself) and Aileen *cough* had an excellent view at the front-most spot on the 1st level – we were practically overlooking the stage, from a side-on vantage. I forgot to bring my camera, but I did have my pda which takes not-too-bad photos, albeit at a fairly low resolution. I even took some video, which, admittedly has fairly crap sound quality compared to the gig, but hey better than nothing! I’ve uploaded pics in my gallery (snippets below) and also might put up a vid or 2 (tho quality isn’t very good, and the camera was shaking a bit coz I was trying to dance whilst taking video.. haha).

The played about equal amounts from old and new albums, which was great coz I hadn’t heard much of their older stuff live before. I enjoyed classics like “Hello”, “The Chariot”, “Days Like These” and “The Rhythm”. Ooh and they even played “The Crowd” too, which was cool. The new stuff included opening with “Sly”, and also included “Lullaby”, “Sol Y Sombra” etc.. in fact I think they played most of the songs on their two albums, as well as a number of improv sections – very cool, like suddenly breaking out into the opening act of The Lion King… which they did rather well, harmonies and all. Haha. They pulled in a freaky variety act mid-concert too – some guy who stuck two sharp swords ALL the way down his throat into his belly?!!!

Anyway, it was great to hear some awesome aussie music again (though it did make me feel slightly homesick.. *sigh*). Bit funny calling them “aussie music”.. their style is so hard to describe.. a fusion of funk, jazz, latin/cuban, with a smattering of rock, laced with some hiphop & rap. It’s just music, and it’s clear they are all incredible musicians, the band is really tight, and the pianist/keys guy Ollie is particularly awe-inspiring. His solos are just amazing! 🙂 And if you can get over the aussie accent, there’s few reasons not to love Cat Empire’s stuff! Gee it sounds like I’m promoting for them huh.

Definitely will be seeing them again at next opportunity – ages away as that may be.

Current listening :: “Two Shoes” – The Cat Empire

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