Playing the first of two nights, The Living End returned to Cairns as part of the ‘Staring Down The Highway’ tour with two mid-week shows completely sold out at The Tanks Arts Centre.
The Wednesday night billing didn’t deter the crowd with the venue nearly full early to hear a pumping opening set by support act ‘The Bennies’, before the main act The Living End, took to the stage energetically with a ripping rendition of ‘Roll On’ to set the mood early.
Moving quickly the band launched straight into ‘Second Solution’ from their debut album with a trademark Scott Owen bass stand while Lead singer/guitarist Chris Cheney made mention that the album came out nearly 20 years ago in 1998. Making a lot of the crowd feel their age very quickly!
Keeping the energy high, the audience came to its feet after an impressive opening guitar solo from Cheney, turned into the opening riff of ‘All Torn Down’ with punters jumping and singing from start to finish. ‘Pictures In The Mirror’ followed and kept the mood high while new song ‘Up The Junction’ showed that the boys still have a knack for writing rock anthems.
With a glimpse of ‘Jimi Hendrix – Voodoo Chile’ and an even more unexpected cover of ‘CCR – Lookin’ Out My Back Door’, the band had the crowd in the palm of their hand with songs like ‘Wake Up’ and ‘White Noise’ gaining huge crowd participation.
One lucky fan was even invited on stage to film from behind the drums and got a selfie with drummer Andy Strachan. Cameras would be flashing again when Cheney stood on top of Owen’s double bass during the outro of ‘West End Riot’, a truly great moment of the performance and iconic image of one of Australia’s top live bands.
Returning for an encore, the trio returned to their roots playing some early rockabilly from their high school days before ending on fan favourites ‘Who’s Gonna Save Us’ and their first hit ‘Prisoner Of Society’. A stella end to a cracking performance by The Living End at The Tanks Arts Centre.
Also good to note that support act The Bennies gave a shout out to the organisers at Garageland for giving them a start and helping grow their Cairns fan base. Good form by the lads from The Bennies! They also gave a shout out to ‘Shanno’ for “hooking us up some grass”.
Mitch Sullivan
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