大象传媒

Japandroids kick off proceedings with their homage to Thin Lizzy's The Boys Are Back in Town with their track The Boys Are Leaving Town - it's a delightfully noisy ramshackle affair which sets the tempo for the rest of their set.

They treat us to a run through off their critically acclaimed Post Nothing LP. They blitz through Young Hearts Spark Fire with such enthusiasm and raw energy it demands you to stand up and take notice. Heart Sweats shows us that even though they are lyrically lightweight, ("Your style is such a mess girl, I should know I used to date a stylist"), they have an astute pop sensibility in amongst their DIY garage rock roots.

It's great to see Japandroids working together. Brian King on Guitar and David Prowse on drums, bounce well of each other and Brian even mentions he can't play his guitar parts unless he sees David's drumming. They create such a frenetic sound that tracks Wet Hair and Rocker's East Vancouver can't help but make your body move.

It's not a totally flawless set as Crazy/Forever and I Quit Girls don't quite pack the same effect they have on record and prove to be a minor blip on an otherwise fantastic set.

Heart Sweats has all the makings of an anthem, stepped in teenage angst and with a chorus which demands you sing along. Sovereignty the highlight from their debut LP and also the highlight of tonight set implores the crowd to get more involved. In fact the lack of enthusiasm from the crowd was the only dissapointing aspect of the set, but this was to be expected with a largely unknown support act.

A Place to Bury Strangers are tonight's headliners and a good sized crowd has made its way to Auntie Annies to see the New York three piece. It's very difficult what to say about their set, apart from it being very poor. What made the show poor could be a variety of things, poor setup, poor sound and what appeared to be a general feeling of disinterest from the band.

As a fan of the band, I'm not coming from an outsider's perspective and seen them only last year pull of a great performance in the Limelight, playing to no more than 15 people, tonight it was very hard to distinguish one track from the other and the whole gig seemed to amalgamate into one long droned noise. The one slightly impressive aspect of the gig was the absolutely blinding lights show on display.

A gig saved only by the unexpected brilliance of the support act. Japandroids, I salute you.

Paul Mullin