It has been six long years since Franz Ferdinand last set foot on a Melbourne stage, and honestly, you could feel the city’s pent-up affection buzzing in the air even before the band walked out.
Before Franz Ferdinand, Teenage Dads and Delivery did a fine job priming the Live at the Gardens crowd, the kind of spirited local openers who make you glad you arrived early to catch some excellent Melbourne talent.
But Franz Ferdinand are a different beast entirely. For a band that once helped detonate the early 2000s indie-disco boom, with angular riffs, sharp trousers, and airtight precision, they have always thrived on a specific kind of tension: cool exterior, raging heartbeat underneath.
So when Alex Kapranos strode out and launched into The Dark of the Matinée, I initially mistook his air of mild detachment as boredom. The first call and response did not exactly echo across the Gardens crowd, and for a moment it felt like Melbourne might be caught flat-footed.
But, as it turns out, that aloofness is just part of the Kapranos mystique. Within minutes, the veneer cracked, not in a showy way, but in the little tells: the grin edging across his face, that sudden spring in his step, the first of several perfectly timed jumps. The crowd caught the shift instantly.
Suddenly the poncho-covered masses were dancing, clapping, shouting. Some even ditched their attempts to stay dry altogether. Luckily it was not cold. It was that ideal Melbourne drizzle where you can pretend you are in a music video (a Franz Ferdinand music video, perhaps) instead of a wet city garden.
Franz Ferdinand – Live at the Gardens
- When: Friday 28 November, 2025
- Where: Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne
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Night or Day, Walk Away, Build It Up, and No You Girls rolled out with force, Franz Ferdinand played like they genuinely loved being there, and that more than anything changes the entire chemistry of a gig for me; when the performers are clearly having as good a time as the audience.
A shadowy swing through Evil Eye set the stage for the inevitable euphoric eruption of Do You Want To. That famous Lucky, lucky, you are so lucky chant hit with the kind of communal electricity only this band can summon, and Kapranos leaned into it, finally giving Melbourne the praise it had fought through the rain to earn.
From there, the set barely touched the ground: 40, Right Action, Black Eyelashes, and a gloriously chaotic Michael, before Love Illumination turned the Gardens into a field of raised hands, just as Kapranos ordered.
Then came Take Me Out. No matter how many times you have heard it live, it still detonates something. The timing, the drop, the dance-punk madness, it remains one of the great live moments of the 2000s (or so this ’99 baby has heard), and the band played it like they knew exactly how lucky we all were to be standing there in the rain together. Kapranos, buzzing off the crowd, asked if we wanted to take things higher, and Hooked made sure the answer was yes, pushing into the set-closing Outsiders.
The encore tease was peak Kapranos mischief, feigned disappointment, dramatic pause, before offering not one but four songs. Audacious, Darts of Pleasure, and Evil and a Heathen tore through the Gardens, leading into the inevitable flame-lit closer This Fire. And by the time it burned out, so had every last drop of hesitation, drizzle, and my early-set uncertainty.
Franz Ferdinand did not just return to Melbourne, they reminded us why their sharp, jittering, joy-drunk energy made them such a vital band in the first place. And honestly, I think the rain improved it.
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