Swervedriver, The Metro – 18/02/2011

It was a night of checkered shirts, torn skinny jeans, unzipped hoodies and gazing down at your converse sneakers as you remembered misspent youth smoking weed and not washing your hair. Yes 90’s grunge returned to the metro.

Kicking off the show was The Laurels. Meandering shoe gazer rock opened the night and lubricated the crowd with psychedelic post Seattle tunes.

Next was the returning stoner rockers from Wollongong Tumbleweed. Returning to the live circuit at the back end of last year. The over 30 crowd grew in anticipation of the guys. They filled the Metro faster than any support band I’d ever seen here and they preceded to deliver sonic bombs to the crowd. Although the sound was kind of muddled, which can happen at the Metro, they still delivered. Running through a career back catalogue, Tumbleweed were entertaining enough in a reminiscence sense. And at my age, we can appreciate now. Nostalgia is not a bad thing.

Swervedriver reformed after internet pressure 3 years ago and they haven’t looked back since. Enchanting the crowd with the songs that shaped a genre, Swervedriver delivered what fans were hoping to get. Sometimes reforming, while the trend, can come off as a sad attempt to recapture the past. With Swervedriver they’ve come back on the back of fan pressure and didn’t let that pressure weaken the performance.

Rock solid and flawless, it was an great night to relive the 90’s.

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