It’s the final day of winter, but the blissful cold has long forsaken the city streets.
The air is thick and wet, sticking to the skin. Seatbelt buckles are back to burning flesh, and everyone moves with an odd sense of urgency, as if by some alacritous miracle, something interesting might, for once, be about to happen in Brisbane.
There’s Riverfire, which means aviation fanatics and your dad who loved Top Gun and ‘would’ve easily been a fighter pilot if not for a vague childhood injury’ will flock like ants to witness the flyover of a F/A-18F Super Hornet. Then there’s the Broncos game (let’s not mention the result), but neither of these seems a viable explanation for the electricity that worms its way into the blood, pulling 700 people inextricably to one place: The Triffid.
After waiting six long years for them to grace our shores, we’re here to send off Inhaler as they wrap up their first-ever tour down under, blitzing three consecutive sold-out shows along the East Coast.
Word on the street is that people in Sydney were camped out from 2 am, which sounds like true dedication until a quick chat with the people at the front of our line informs me that some arrived at 11:45 pm the day before. Forget dedication; this is devotion. This is discipleship.
Whoever created the stigma that Australia has a low-effort culture had clearly never met an Inhaler fan. Touring off the back of two successful albums – a monumental understatement, It Won’t Always Be Like This was the quickest-selling debut album on vinyl from any band this century – it’s not surprising that their first shows on the other side of the world are met with an almost religious fervour.
I find myself in the second row, crammed sardines in a tin can (genuinely, the roof is a curved sheet of metal), yet somehow the boys have brought the cold from Ireland with them, and the mosh is a pleasant reprieve from the blistering night. Time distorts, and suddenly, The Vanns are on stage, golden apparitions surrounded by warm light.
The Aussie rockers launch into their set with a zeal that’s infectious, and everyone is screaming the lyrics to classics like Fake Friends and Keep My Cool. Vocalist Jimmy Vann leaps onto the barrier, leaning over us in a Zeppelin shirt that’s extremely on-brand. Then, it’s serotonin overflow as Cameron Little saturates song after song with electric solos. No one knows who to look at, heads on a constant swivel like we’re watching a Wimbledon rally until Vann joins Cameron, leaning against his shoulder as they play through their final number.
If you were to Google ‘iconic walkout songs’, you’d naturally see names like Thunderstruck and Welcome To The Jungle staring back at you from the abyss of archetypal rock n’ roll. While tried and true, it’s also predictable, something Inhaler definitively isn’t. And so, as the lights blossom into a romantic carmine, the Dublin quartet waltz out to the tune of Henry Mancini’s Lujon (OG fans will remember the days it used to be LPFJ2 by A$AP Rocky), and the stark juxtaposition between romance and rock only proves this song an all the more iconic choice.
“This one’s for anyone Irish out there,” Elijah Hewson’s eyes search the sea of faces that stare up at him as the opening riff of Dublin In Ecstasy carves open the skin and travels raw and burning down the spine. This track, in particular, holds a deep significance for long-time fans of the band.
Although officially released in their sophomore album Cuts & Bruises last year, this song has had a cult following for years. It has long been the backbone of many of the band’s earlier gigs, considering they wrote it when they were still teenagers. With every shaky phone recording uploaded to YouTube, comments amassed time and time again, heralding its official release. There was something innate in these videos, a magic that bled through the cracked audio and one-pixel footage. And yes, I am referring to that intoxicating 2019 indigo recording from the Camden Assembly Pub.
“You feeling okay?” Hewson—the son of Bono—checks in with a warm smile. “We’ve done a lot of flying in the last few days. We were asleep about an hour ago, so thanks for waking us up. We’re really happy to be here!” Sliding from rock to groove, Louis Lambert on keys leads the band into The Things I Do – for any piano enthusiasts out there, these chords are courtesy of Black Grape’s Martin Slattery – and the mosh turns into a liquid disco.
“Any people feel like jumping up and down?” Robert Keating studiously observes us, the corner of his mouth quirking in the beginnings of a grin you’d miss if you blinked. He’s met with a caterwaul cocktail of approval as he lays down the bassline of Who’s Your Money On? (Plastic House) backed by drummer Ryan McMahon’s bass kick, and everyone’s bobbing up and down like meerkats on danger watch in double speed.
“Which of you queued up early this morning? Was it all you at the front? You’re crazy; we love you, though,” Hewson pauses, brows furrowing in incredulous recognition. He points to a girl behind me, delighted, almost laughing. “…Have you been to every show?”
She nods earnestly, and he’s shaking his head in impressed disbelief. They know firsthand how brutal the flight schedules are. “Damn, you’re the crazy one. We like that. This song is for you!” They launched into Cheer Up Baby, and everyone lost it.
The encore turned the tin-can-Triffid into a rock colosseum, a rock cathedral. We’d been waiting all night for guitarist Josh Jenkinson’s cornerstone solo and groovy dance moves at the end of It Won’t Always Be Like This. It’s one of, if not the most important moment of the whole show. It’s the bedrock of the band’s idiosyncratic spark. Inhibitions are thrown to the wayside; who cares where, who, or what you are? This is the Jenkinson solo. Let go and let joy. Everything else will find its way.
Love will get you there. And hopefully, love will get them back to Australia. After a daring shoey in his new boots, Hewson is definitely owed a replacement pair (here’s to looking at you, Sydney).
