The Proletariate

"...with a show that's come full circle since their first gigs earlier this year, proving themselves as one of the town's best little hardcore acts." - The Drum Media 19/11/09 - The Drum Media Perth

With ye olde Hyde Park Hotel up on the blocks for at least the next six months or so, the prestigious underbelly of Perth’s celebrated punk and hardcore communities are seeking newer (and less corporate) venues for their exciting nights of debauchery. And the Civic Hotel, located up Inglewood way at 981 Beaufort Street, certainly ticks the boxes when it comes to big two stage shows. A good choice, then, for The Proletariate’s Covered in Bruises CD launch – which was always going to work better with an enormous line-up.

The back room of the Civic seems perfectly suited to this kinda caper. It’s a truly cavernous concert beer barn, the likes of which you don’t really see any more. The main PA is great, and the alcove space provides the perfect area for a second stage at 90 degrees to the main, so punters merely have to alter their drinking stance to enjoy the next band. There are, however, disadvantages. The Civic is a weird pub. They charge venue hire, for a start, as a flat fee, which hurts promoters. The pub’s kitchen closes before 9pm. Punters aren’t allowed to take jugs into the band room, and for some reason they insist on shutting up the bar and locking the entrance to the band room before the headlining act has actually finished.

The Civic is also a sprawling venue with a fantastic beer garden. The ‘curse of the fantastic beer garden’ should be well known to those who have attended the Rosemount Hotel, and tonight seemed to be the night that everybody discovered that there was more to the Civic than met the eye – and spent as much time socialising with friends as watching music. ‘It’s like the Galleria of pubs’, remarked one punter of the venue’s enormity. This, of course, hurt the bands for most of the night.

Still, newcomers Scalphunter had a small but keen early crowd as they belted out their flat-out punk rock’n’roll—reminiscent perhaps of Zeke and early Turbonegro. Featuring former members of The Iconoclast and Drunk In Japan, and starring the relentless straight-backed drumming of the Chainsaw Hookers’ Tristan Broomhall; Scalphunter are at their best when they’re doing call and response songs which give them vocal diversity. Singer/guitarist Big Steve’s almost monotone shouty delivery is relentless, but it’s good to break it up a little.

Another band who seriously know their shit are Death Grenade. Playing mind-meltingly fast hardcore, all riffs and blast-beats; they bashed their way through their set without much in the way of banter or crowd interaction. Which sucks given that the guys are so entertaining off the stage. But then, it’s just no bullshit hardcore innit.

Crowd levels remained steady as The Decline hit the stage. These guys have just gotten back from a $50,000 jaunt to California to record with one of the guys from The Descendents, which is awesome, and (in case you can’t guess from the name), they love NOFX. A lot. You don’t get bands like this very often this side of 1999. It’s a hard style to get right. The Decline are better than most but there’s still some improvements that could be made—a harmony guitar interlude that goes nowhere is kinda pointless, for example.

Probably Perth’s best proponents of sludge-informed crust, or grind informed hardcore, Suffer belted out their shit on the main stage in fine form. Still missing were the great majority of punters, and at this point some stingy bastards started complaining that they had to pay ten bucks to see a show. Seriously. Suffer are pretty good. The singer really gets into it. Drummer Luke is a mad cunt with the sticks also.

Speaking of styles that you don’t see too much any more, Mandalay Victory are doing the whole chug-a-lug metalcore thing, heavy on the breakdowns, and even featured a guy doing the monkey dance routine. The crowd did seem to enjoy proceedings as the band bounced up and down and threw themselves about.

Headliners for the night were of course The Proletariate, who declared “Fuck Woolworths” (in reference to the aforementioned Hydey) as they took to the main stage with easily the biggest crowd of the night. For once, the majority of punters were front and centre, and the band put on a kick-arse performance full of energy. Front man Adam Dwyer was down in the audience early giving confrontational delivery, while the other four members of the band leaped around the stage and totally made the night worth it.

There was plenty of banter all around, as the band made the most of what was, after all, their evening. Full of conviction and carrying on like mad dogs, The Proletariate have certainly arrived, and tonight they made the Civic their own, if only for the 30-or-so minutes that they were on stage.

A great night that would have been more crazy had it been at a smaller venue. Still, the Civic is almost always great fun for the punters regardless.
- fasterlouder.com.au