Live Review: David Byrne, Kimbra

There's a sparse smattering of audience members inside the arena as we take our seats for Kimbra. Her silky, floor-length, all-over pattern culottes with matching floaty top and black bralette underneath would probably flatter no one else on the planet, but Kimbra absolutely rocks this outfit. Settle Down morphs into a segment from Somebody That I Used To Know (can we all just acknowledge right now how perfect Kimbra's feature is on said Gotye song?). Kimbra is backed/bookended by two multi-instrumentalist/keyboardists this evening and strikes us as an artist who is still trying to figure out where she fits. Talented? No doubt. We hear her new single Lightyears, which Kimbra tells us is scheduled to drop next month. But it's the banger Kimbra closes with, Top Of The World, which channels MIA, that's the clear standout track of her set. 

Sound effects including crickets and thunderstorms fill the silence as the stage is set up for the one and only David Byrne. Stagehands comb through strands of floor-to-ceiling fringing, which borders the performance space, separating it with their fingers. A model brain is placed on a card table with a wooden chair behind it. 

Under a sharp spotlight, Byrne appears seated at the table and handles the model brain during opener, Here. We freak out. He's actually here. Song two is X-Press 2's Lazy (on which Byrne features). Backing band members march out with their instruments attached on harnesses so that they can travel freely around the stage - there is nothing affixed to the stage, all instruments are cordless and portable. All musicians are barefoot and decked out in matching grey Kenzo suits. The long strands that have been so lovingly groomed during intermission make up a beaded curtain. The choreography is astounding, with the two backing vocalists - Chris Giarmo and Tendayi Kuumba - executing particularly intricate movements and gestures. It looks like a joyous experience from a performer's perspective and by song three (Talking Heads' I Zimbra) even those in the bleachers are upstanding. 

At the tail end of St Vincent collab song, I Should Watch TV, Byrne walks off stage through a section of the beaded curtain, which is illuminated by LEDs to resemble a TV set, for a brief moment. Trippy. Byrne then takes the mic to commend this country's mandatory voting system - pointing out he's put systems in place to allow potential voters to register in the foyers of his own Stateside shows in the past to encourage people to vote. After adding that some members of the United States population find mandatory voting a bit "hard to conceive", Byrne says he points out to these naysayers, "Yeah, it's true! It's also possible in Brazil!" He then pauses before admitting with a chuckle, "It doesn't guarantee good outcomes." Byrne then tells us the percentage of American citizens who vote is "sometimes as low as 20%". Referring to today's Victorian state election, he then hilariously adds, "I hope that if you didn't vote then the fine finds you!" 

Everybody's Coming To My House follows. Byrne praises the a cappella high school choir he invited in to do a version of this song ("which is really beautiful, you can see it online") and admits their take on the song changed its meaning for him. "My version - being me - it sort of reeked of a little bit of anxiety and other things like that," he enlightens. "Everybody coming to my house it was a little bit, 'Ok, that's enough maybe...' [laughs]. Their version somehow - without changing any of the words, they made it be about welcome and inclusion, and I thought, 'Their version's better than mine!'" Byrne then stresses he is Scottish, but somehow landed in New York when his parents relocated in search of work. Many people on his stage come "from everywhere", Byrne acknowledges, since his band comprises "many immigrants... and we could not do this show without them," he extols. 

Home incorporates some moves from the OG music video. Byrne performs the Once In A Lifetime verses, in trademark furious fashion, under a cluster of spotlights before his band is illuminated to march forward in unison, in straight-line formation, "Letting the days go by..." Some idiots take a toilet break during Doing The Right Thing, but they totally miss out since instruments poke through the beaded fringe curtain to be played by human hands that seem disconnected from bodies.

Even the live visual editing is top-notch with layered footage on the giant screens maximising creative impact. Before his Fatboy Slim cowrite Toe Jam, Byrne tells us the musical for which this song was composed (Here Lies Love, based on the life of the former First Lady of the Philippines and well-known shoe fanatic, Imelda Marcos) very nearly made it onto the Melbourne stage (in fact Byrne was here doing some casting at one point). Byrne adds that the BBC deemed this song's accompanying music video "almost not suitable for work".

Because he continuously gets asked by journalists to prove the musicians on his stage are actually supplying all these sounds live, a song - Born Under Punches (The Heat Goes On) - is built from scratch, sonically, before our eyes (and ears) as Byrne introduces each musician individually and by their full names (when Bobby Wooten struts forward and strums that bass - OMG!). A bongo player swings his instrument side to side to the beat while he plays, especially during I Dance Like This. That Giarmo and Kuumba manage to sing while executing energetic versions of dance steps such as The Pony is a Christmas miracle. The stage even becomes a travelator at one point. 

Blackout. When performers are illuminated lying still on the stage it appears they've been gunned down - a shocking sight. Bullet. This is confronting theatre. When a stage light gets rolled out in front of the performers, their silhouettes are thrown up and magnified against the beaded fringe curtain during another Talking Heads track, Blind. But we're still a bit shattered and contemplative post-Bullet. 

Burning Down The House sees the ensemble in military formation, marching in straight lines that rotate to form evolving patterns. The lighting designer's choice of extreme red wash that flashes in on the one of "Burning..." is inspired.  

Our first encore starts with a tight circle of musicians holding lights under their faces, singing Road To Nowhere a cappella. Then there's a second encore. Byrne introduces Janelle Monae's Hell You Talmbout by pondering, "I would like to think it’s about the possibility of change.” Kimbra is welcomed back to the stage to help out on this song and Byrne bemoans the fact that although it came out in 2015, Monae's statement remains just as relevant today. Endless audience clapping. We're left in awe wondering how any other artist could possibly top this spectacle.