Courtney Barnett @ O2 ABC, Glasgow, 2 Dec
She’s not just Aussie, Courtney Barnett, she’s the definition of it. Cleaving to her country’s most worthy musical exports, she takes the O2 ABC stage to the blustering melody of Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds’ Dig! Lazarus, Dig!, and winds up the sold out show with an encore rendition of Know Your Product by southern hemisphere punk progenitors The Saints. And in-between, with little fanfare but bags of amiable swagger, the laid back grunge girl from Melbourne shows how to completely and utterly charm an adoring Glasgow audience.
A one-two-three killer punch comes in the form of opener Elevator Operator, despite the slightly muddy sound quality, then the idiosyncratic Avant Gardner has Barnett at her most quintessential, outlining the details of a gardening-inspired panic attack in deliciously deadpan fashion, before a seamless transition into the bluesy bass line and snapping riffs of Dead Fox, yet another introspective tongue in cheeck gem from Barnett's endearingly quirky debut Sometimes I Sit And Think, And Sometimes I Just Sit.
In the flesh, Barnett’s is band sensibility – no front and center for her, instead preferring to track stage right and muscle along some sturdy rock jams with her touring crew, bassist Andrew Sloane and percussionist Davey Mudie. Perhaps it’s this energetic but near perfunctory playing that so satisfyingly compliments the singer’s redoubtable lyrics; the meat and potatoes grunge rock a sturdy backbone to Barnett’s 21st century Antipodean ruminations on everything from lawn mowing and attempted murder (Small Poppies) to house parties and existentialist indecision (Nobody Really Cares If You Don’t Go To The Party).
Pedestrian At Best belies its ironic title as it lays claim to being the most foot-stomping, raucous sing-along of the night, but the down-tempo Depreston most ensnares the attention of the packed venue. Under the ABC's glittering disco ball swells the slow ballad about a nondescript Melbourne suburb, detailing the mind-numbing minutae of urban life and transcending geography to become something much greater – much like the inimitable Ms Barnett herself.