Things Of Stone And Wood @ The Gov, 10th May ’14
Good bands should never die! Things Of Stone and Wood made a triumphant return to The Gov and it is hard to believe that they are commemorating their twenty five year anniversary.
Where most bands reform for money to top up their superannuation the original line up of Greg Arnold (lead vocals, guitar), Michael Allen (bass guitar and back vocals), Justin Brady (violin, mandolin and harmonica) and Tony Floyd (drums and percussion) have reformed for the love of playing their music together once again.
Definitely hard to compete with the crowd across the road at the Entertainment Centre who were seeing Arctic Monkeys but nevertheless it was a strong and loyal group who loved every minute of it. For me, I missed out on seeing these guys in their hey day so it was great to be finally seeing them play a good splattering of hits from their classic albums The Yearning and Junk Theatre.
So many great songs but there is definitely something great about Rain Fell Down with the band going at it in full flight. It was great to hear Arnold saying they were having fun on this tour and that they haven’t hung out in a while and its good when people turn up. A shameless plug for the re-released of Live At The Espy which Allen suggested they were lucky they repressed it as they had to relearn the songs.
Wildflowers, Fingertips, Ghosts Of Castlemaine and Barkly Street were all fantastic topped off by Rock This Boat. It was great to see people out of their chairs having a bit of a dance and the smiles from the band as they lap up the attention.
Throughout the night Arnold made some comments which were interesting but more like reminiscing about past tours of Adelaide. He mentioned that 1992 was the last time they played at The Gov when the stage was over against that wall and Tony (nick named the Trivia King) was throwing up at their other gig at Cafe Boltz further prompting whether the Old Lion was still going!
It was definitely a surreal moment hearing their massive single Happy Birthday Helen in all its splendour sounding just as good now as it did all the way back in 1992 (showing my age a bit now). The opening of this one is almost unbeatable “Let’s not forget last night/ Yeah, how we drove along the Yarra/ How we sang harmonies/ To Carole King” and the only thing that was missing were the images of Melbourne’s iconic trams and the St Kilda Foreshore. Hearing this was definitely one of those moments you wish you could bottle up to enjoy again later on.
The main set was brought to an end with In Our Home with Arnold saying being over forty isn’t so bad as we do this lap around the country, thanks so much see-ya! The encore was just deserts for the loyal following but the take away moment that will stick in my mind is Single Perfect Raindrop and the image of Mikey in track pants in the film clip, well it was 1993! It was a great night and fingers crossed that this isn’t the last we’ll see of Things Of Stone and Wood.
Whether it is rummaging through vinyl at record stores such as Clarity and Title finding hidden gems to scouring the internet to find that album by the next big thing or chasing bands to get that elusive autograph and photo his passion is music all the way.
- Aversions Crown - January 27, 2017
- Sick Of It All - January 19, 2017
- Refused - January 11, 2017
