Words with pictures

The Butterfly Effect

Date: July 10, 2009
Venue: The Tivoli, Brisbane
Acts: The Butterfly Effect, Dead Letter Circus, Calling All Cars

I sometimes wonder whether stunning art-deco venues in other cities snobbishly shy away from hosting metal and punk-inspired acts because of all the associated stereotypes of the acts — and the crowds they draw.

But, whatever the policy elsewhere, at The Tivoli, if it’s good enough for pop-starlet Katy Perry or Brazillian six-string legend Joao Rabello, it’s good enough for louder acts like Trivium, and tonight, home-town rock-metal favourites The Butterfly Effect.

The Butterfly Effect have brought Melbourne trio Calling All Cars and fellow Brisbanites Dead Letter Circus in tow, and a substantial number of people wedge themselves against the barrier from the get-go as the former take the stage.

If nothing else, Calling All Cars possess verve. Vocalist Haydn Ing flits around the stage erratically — first leaping onto the foldbacks for a thrash at his guitar, then teetering on the kick-drum of brother James Ing. The rocket-fuelled, fuzzing slabs of guitar underpinning their melodic punk never quite match the intensity of Haydyn’s piercing 1,000 watt stare, but tracks Hey You and Animal still deliver hooks in spades, while the Weezer-esque undercurrent in latest single Not Like Anybody offers an intriguing change of direction near the end.

From the outset, Kim Benzie’s vocals wobble and thin as they strain for the higher registers on The Mile. It makes for a poor beginning from Dead Letter Circus — it oughtn’t take two or three songs to warm up. The crowd is unperturbed, hundreds of faithful fans adding their own throaty, drunken voicings to song after ball-tearing song. Speed seems the key: guitar, bass and drums pulverised into an jet-propelled howling, ear-splitting mass that is often low on precision, but high on passion.

Although puzzling, it’s not the choice of Dire Straits’ Money For Nothing as entrance music that has this listener wincing at the beginning of the Butterfly Effect’s set. Nor is it vocalist Clint Boge’s dubious navy chic — tonight kitted out like some old-timer admiral in a jacket with ornate gold piping.

No, it’s the sound and mixing — an aural mess of low vocals and whining feedback that largely obliterates the first four songs. It’s testimony to the band’s gutsiness — and perhaps the devotion they inspire — that they claw their way through the disastrous beginning without losing the interest of the capacity crowd. On the other hand, it’s an indictment of the sound engineer that it takes so long to fix.

Kinks finally ironed out, the gig becomes a gilt-edged opportunity to contrast the crisp, open dynamics and chunky riffing of the early Butterfly Effect sound against the sonically denser, prog-inspired palettes of present-day creations from Final Conversation Of Kings.

If anything, it’s impossible to split the response for the two: one moment some 1,500 punters are pumping fists in the air madly for the latter (Room Without a View), then they’re moshing crazily for the former (One Second Of Insanity). They sneak in to steal the closing lines of Reach, then are awed to utter silence as Boge reinterprets fan-favourite Beautiful Mine into a haunting piano ballad with the temporary help of local funk-master Tyrone Noonan. Boge’s shivering falsetto strikes such high, pure notes that it almost threatens to shatter glass.

Later, an upbeat funk-reggae version of the Australian Crawl classic Reckless finds favour with the crowd. It’s another sign that the band is determined to evolve.

Set-closer Worlds On Fire is, perhaps, the standard-bearer of the band’s prog-influenced evolution. Kurt Goedhart’s pinched, echoing guitar warps back and through Boge’s strained voice as he rails against apathy and defeatism. Over long minutes, first through a keys interlude, then one of horns, the song shifts gears, building into the style of incendiary bombast that Muse long-since perfected.

Unquestionably, the burning-down-the-house close slays the audience. But band wield themes like a bludgeon. A 10-minute “do something” rock opus accompanied by an obesity-inducing portion of brutal war footage tells no new story. We implicitly understand war is bad and that evil prospers when good people do nothing. The real challenge for The Butterfly Effect is to add the ounce of subtlety that will prevent them from inadvertently turning themselves into caricatures.