Given the focus of the EGs is generally (refreshingly) on the elders of the scene, it seemed a savvy move on the organisers’ part to open proceedings with a high-impact set from teen-ish sister trio Stonefield. Stonefield do cut-the-bullshit ‘four on the floor’ rock with the ‘on the floor!’ part almost like a command. Of course, like their truncated version of Led Zep’s Whole Lotta Love, we’ve heard it all before… but not from young girls. So major success is likely.
The biggest winners in the awards proper were Wagons with Best Band and Best Album, and Gotye with Best Song, Best Male, and, due to cracking number one on the albums charts, the Outstanding Achievement award. It was an only-at-the-EGs moment when Music Victoria boss and awards founder Patrick Donovan presented the Lifetime Achievement (Waldo) award to legendary RRR presenter Stephen ‘Ghost’ Walker, whose wheelchair-bound status has not diminished his personal gravitas one iota. The only winner that had me scratching my head was Blondie as Best Tour… more like ‘most recognised nominee in the voting shortlist’, I’d say.
As always for the EGs, the awards presentation was merely a small distraction from a full night of great live music. Before Hall Of Fame inductees The Hoodoo Gurus took the stage, a parade of local musicians paid tribute by performing a Gurus classic alongside one of their own songs.
Jane Badler was about 80% pout as she crooned Miss Freelove ’69 (a song you could believe she was the inspiration for) in an arrangement liberally adapted to her own brand of lounge-lizard cool. Frequent EGs guest Kim Salmon was all pumping fist and flying orange frizz as he performed Cheap And Nasty – a piece of anthemic punk from his Perth days that was actually co-written by The Gurus’ Dave Faulkner – while fellow EGs veteran Ron Peno was once again all passion and no pitch.
Sophia Brous cut impressively through the common-denominator horseplay with her compelling and bewildering original Streamers, before The Living End’s Chris Cheney strung his own Heatwave into The Gurus’ Death Ship in a manner that demonstrated either the familiarity of the former or the timelessness of the latter. Or both.
Finally The Gurus themselves took the stage, quickly proving they still had the energy and the stage smarts to keep an audience in the palm of their hand. Cleverly spacing out their hits, the show ended with the double-hit of lighter-flyer Bittersweet and foot-stomper Like Wow Wipeout.
The crowd was a bit thinner this year, possibly siphoned off by the finale of Spicks And Specks. For my part, as long as they keep putting on these shindigs, I’ll keep coming. But if the EGs want to ensure their relevance into the future, I’d recommend they bite the bullet and make their voting system truly democratic and forget the arbitrary shortlists.
LOVED: Brous. She’s the thinking man’s hottie.
HATED: Don’t hate, but am constantly mystified by the crowd’s love of Ron Peno.
DRANK: The atmosphere.
