Live Review: Ben Folds

At a time when grunge music, house and dodgy rap had taken over the '90s music scene, Ben Folds (and his 'Five') came out of the blue.

What, there's no lead guitar? The singer plays the piano? It was revolutionary, but we caught on. Australia, in particular, embraced the dorky, slacker musings of the be-speckled Ben Folds, even going so far as to claim him when he married an Aussie and moved to Adelaide for a time.

So, whenever he tours the country, we welcome him with open arms and reminisce. Tonight was a chance for us to become a part of the show — as was promised at the start, we would have a chance to throw paper planes onto the stage as requests for his last set. But first, we were treated to a handpicked mix from Folds himself.

The first set contains a mix of mostly solo tracks, which was suitable seeing as it was just Folds and a piano on stage. The poor Steinway was treated in a way it's probably not been used before. Folds stomped the sustain pedal with vigour and had no qualms about hammering the keys during some songs. This also meant that he didn't always hit the right notes. More than a few times, there were errant keys being mashed, but Folds didn't baulk and for all the honky tonk, it kind of suited the instrument. At least he didn't throw his stool at it!

The crowd were involved early with some four-part harmonies being conducted in Bastard and songs were broken up with entertaining and usually amusing anecdotes from Folds' life. One story in particular, regarding a violent backstage altercation, was an eye-opening preamble to Not A Fan.

Ultimately Folds knew he had us captivated and he played it up, prompting the audience to yell out lines in songs and sing along. Steven's Last Night In Town finished the opening part of the night, but not before an inexplicable but also very entertaining drum solo, playing on a kit that was assembled before our very eyes while he played it. He sure has some drum chops!

The rules were simple. Throw your planes, Folds selected ten of them from the stage and played them. Ten only and if he dropped one it's just because he didn't know it or had already played it. Oh, and no Kanye! It's a fascinating experiment and one that almost backfired immediately as the first song commenced. While he performed The Luckiest, a touching and loving song (one of his rare ones), people continued to throw paper planes and the cheers and laughs from the audience distracted from one of the more beautiful songs of the night. Folds laughed it off though, indicating that it was one of the longest plane throwing periods he'd ever seen!

The following songs were predominantly from his group days, which was to be expected. We got outstanding solo versions of Underground, Best Imitation Of Myself, Emaline, Philosophy and Song For The Dumped. The crowd chipped in where needed and it was a bubbly vibe. The anticipation of each song, as he picked up the plane, carefully unfolded it, and placed it on the grand piano, never announcing it, but sometimes dropping a small story surrounding it, kept us smiling all night.

The gimmick meant that there were some songs not played, including the very popular but also very personal Brick, but when we thought that all was done, a last-minute encore of Army and One Angry Dwarf And 200 Solemn Faces left us more than satisfied with a rollicking, exciting and fun gig. It's just a shame that some cleaner will have all that paper to clear away.