Live Review: MONO, Jo Quail, Selfless Orchestra

Wednesday brought Perth fans down to the Rosemount Hotel for a midweek show from Japan's masters of post-rock, MONO.

Early patrons got to witness Selfless Orchestra fresh from their Fringe World show Great Barrier. The band are a guitar-forward post-rock supergroup of Perth musos. They are definitely a talented bunch, but the music didn’t really grab us. We imagine that the show would have been more impressive when paired with their ocean-diving cinematic backdrop, which was sadly missing this evening.

One of life’s small joys is discovering a new act who truly moves you. For us, Jo Quail was one such act. Having never heard any of her work, the night's short introduction was mind-blowing. The range and emotion she was able to get out of her electric cello, paired with a series of loop and effect pedals, was incredible. Hunched passionately over her instrument, Quail built a towering sound that lurched from delicate to violent.

Jo Quail @ Rosemount Hotel. Photo by Shaun Noonan.

MONO took to the stage with new drummer Dahm Majuri Cipolla. He has some large shoes to fill, having recently replaced Yasunori Takada, who was MONO's driving, rhythmic backbone for 18 years. But right from the opening track God Bless, Cipolla proved himself up to task.

The four-piece took us on a journey rocketing from delicate xylophone intros to tinnitus-inducing walls of noise with face-melting strobes. Although billed as a 20th-anniversary show, over half of the songs were taken from last year's Nowhere Now Here. Longtime fans, however, were treated to older cuts from classic releases like Death In Rebirth off Requiem For Hell (our personal favourite MONO track).

MONO @ Rosemount Hotel. Photo by Shaun Noonan.

Highlights from the set included Tamaki Kunishi's vocals on Breathe - a rarity with the band being almost exclusively instrumental. Jo Quail took to the stage to perform cello on Halcyon (Beautiful Days) and the encore performance of Com (?) concluded with Taka Goto screaming into the pickups of his guitar while the audience was deafened and blinded.

As always, we were left wanting more. The good news is the highly prolific band is nearly always recording or touring, so we won’t have to wait long it.

MONO @ Rosemount Hotel. Photo by Shaun Noonan.