Philadelphia Grand Jury

Coming off the back of a sold out night at the Republic Bar in Hobart, the small crowd greeting Philadelphia Grand Jury may have been slightly underwhelming. During the main support act - Howl, who played a solid and very enthusiastic set, the crowd swelled, as if everyone was timing their arrival until just before the band started. The questionably named Hotel New York hosted the second date of the Save Our Town tour, a appropriate title given the Launceston's lack of live music and its seeming inability to embrace it lately.

Those who had come out were clearly keen for one hell of a gig, and it was obvious when the band walked onstage and launched into their extremely popular cover of Jay-Z's '99 Problems'. Sung by new Brisbane born and Berlin based drummer Susie Patten, mostly whilst running around in the crowd while frontman Simon "Berkfinger" Berckelmanv took over drum duties. No doubt if the rest of the crowd had been anything like the people around me, they had been desperately hoping that the band would play the song, and they didn't have to wait at all.

Afterwards normal programming resumed as Susie took refuge behind the drums and Simon said hello to the crowd and with the help of bassist Joel “MC Bad Genius” Beeson got underway with the first original of the night, the ironic and infectious 'I Don't Want To Party (Party)'.

They brought the mood down somewhat with the creepy brilliance of 'When Your Boyfriend Comes Back to Town'. 'Growing Up Alone' was an early set highlight, and the jumping and dancing and generally frenzied crowd lapped it up eagerly. For the second time already Simon informed the audience that we could in fact call them the Philly Jays. With the formalities out the door, the band seemed to get really into the lyrically coarse tinged 'The New Neil Young'.

While it seemed that many people had not heard 'Save Our Town', which features on the extra track laden re-issue of their (slightly renamed) debut album; 'Hope is for the Hopeless', that didn't seem to dampen people's enthusiasm for dancing to the unabashed fun that is their new single.

This gig had loads of energy and the band really seemed to be enjoying themselves, so much so that after Simon said, 'You can call us the Philly Jays' no less than five times, the whole crowd felt nearly felt on first name basis with the band by the end of the gig. Clearly singing “I'm gonna kill you” at the crowd while playing the song of the same name did nothing to hinder the growing rapport.

The set was easily one of if not the best gig I've seen this year and should've attracted far more people. The only criticism of it was its briefness. It seemed to fly by, yet The Philly Jays (yes I'm allowed to call them that now) also found time to play hits, 'Wet Winter Holiday', the very upbeat 'Going to the Casino (Tomorrow Night)' before ending the vibrant set with arguably their best song and most well-known, 'The Good News'. Most of it featuring frontman Simon standing deep into the crowd whilst playing. The band stayed around for pictures and chatted to those who'd come out to see them and seemed genuinely happy to do so, which for concert goers can really make a gig a memorable one. Yet take nothing away from the way they played. The band are certainly worth the entrance fee and I couldn't recommend attending one of their shows highly enough.

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