Jimmy Eat Sydney @ Roundhouse

It won't come as much of a surprise to anyone who reads this blog often enough that my posts are very rarely ever live reviews. Aside from the fact that Dean and Javid are more seasoned and skilled live reviewers, I just don’t really do gigs. Obviously working every weekend, living an hour or two from most of the live events I’d like to attend and the proverbial uni student lack of money scenario don’t help the situation but more importantly I just don’t think I’m cut out for your average gig. I value personal space (both my own and that of others), I don’t enjoy sweating outside of the sporting arena, I don’t like paying through the tooth for a plastic cup of anything, I’m not wild about large groups of people and I am insistent on unobstructed view… very few live events are made for picky, whiny, ingrates like myself.

I can hear you all saying now “But Pix, It’s about the music man!!!” I agree whole heartedly. So when I make the daring decision to travel into the city, it is not without good reason. Naturally when I heard about the very under promoted Jimmy Eat World appearance at the UNSW Roundhouse, I jumped at the chance to skip my first lecture for 2010.

Oww and the bill also included Rx Bandits, Motion City Soundtrack, Glassjaw and emo gods Sunny Day Real Estate. I skipped Rx Bandits, I saw Motion City Soundtrack play 1 or 2 catchy but dated pop punk songs (including my favourite Everything is Alright) as they try to hang on to better days. Glassjaw had a very cool bass player but not much else. While Glassjaw certainly seemed to rip through a tight set, I think this was more another payday along the journey rather than something they put their heart and soul into. Songs requests by fans seemed to be met with dismissive sarcasm as they were clearly reluctant to break away from the pre-prepared set list. One fan remarked “we’ve been waiting 10 years for this” and my heart ached to think this mediocre set was what they’d been waiting for.

Onward now to the near show stealing performance of Sunny Day Real Estate. While I will confess to only knowing maybe 2-3 songs previous (one being the opener “In Circles”) I wasn’t really entering into watching them with any major excitement, more so the novelty of seeing bass player Nate Mendel was more on my agenda. Unsurprisingly Sunny Day Real Estate absolutely put to shame my lack luster enthusiasm. Despite not being familiar with the tracks, it wasn’t hard to marvel at the vocals of Dan Hoerner and the interplay between himself and guitarist Jeremy Enigk. It won’t come as a surprise to any true-blue Sunny Day fan, Nate Mendel just bops along doing his own thing, seemingly blissfully unaware of which band he’s playing with.

An absolute master class had me questioning whether a support act slot was good enough for these guys and I honestly think even Jimmy Eat World would have considered themselves truly fortunate to have such an act on the undercard. I think putting Sunny Day Real Estate on first did at the least serve to ensure Jimmy Eat World couldn’t afford to drop their game and get away with it. Funnily enough Sunny Day Real Estate didn't have merch on sale, clearly the bandwagon fan purchase of johnny come-latelys like myself is not welcomed by these classy indviduals.

Finally after what seemed like a prolonged wait due to the endless amount of other acts, Jimmy Eat World took the stage and opened with my favourite “A Praise Chorus”. On a personal note I was hoping to warm into things a little more before I was hit with my favourite but again that’s just a personal bitching. As the set went on they weaved in the very new with the very old quite seamlessly and while I will confess I don’t know a great deal of their music pre-Bleed American I was definitely impressed that they put in the earlier tunes in appreciation that their audience were not all first exposed to the band from the track “The Middle” like myself. Tracks like “Blister” and “Goodbye Sky Harbor” were received with equal excitement as the more well known tracks. It seemed there were very few fly-by-nightly Jimmy Eat World fans there like myself as the majority of the crowd happily sung every word bad to Atkins, of which he was very appreciative.

Ironically for a ground level admirer like myself, their most identifiable track “The Middle” was tarnished by a botched and despite not playing “The Authority Song” or even an encore, Jimmy Eat World managed to demonstrate they are certainly not a spent force. While I would go as far as saying I extremely enjoyed what could be seen as a predictably solid set, I was more amazed that their back catalogue is so filled with great tracks that they could afford to not play the likes of “The Authority Song” and still impress greatly.

Since we're talking emo, I thought I might aswell make the final thought a bit emo too... To make the night even better I spent it with gorgeous girlfriend Clare, my fellow whiteboy Chris and a swagger of great friends including but not limited to Ash, Andy, Sarah, Mitch, Cameron, Holly, Shifty, B.K, Sheep, Lisa, Mick & Monkey… although I saw some more than others (sorry if I forgot anyone). It may seem strange to mention everyone who I went with and my intention wasn’t to throw out pointless shout outs but to illustrate that Jimmy Eat World were not just a band I enjoyed growing up but they were central to the teenage years of so many people my age and the experiences which have been paired with the Jimmy Eat World discography have given these songs special meaning to so many. Last night was a great celebration of that.

P.s Turns out my picture taking stunk and pics didn't come out at all... if you managed to get some good snaps please email them to whiteboydancefloor@hotmail.com and I'll add them in and give credit (if that's ok).