Live Review: Title Fight, Paper Arms, The Gifthorse

If you’re an international punk band landing in Brisbane, you’re not going to find a more rock solid local support act than The Gifthorse. As per usual, the boys do everything right – delivering their earnest tunes with a raw polish completely suited for tonight.

Adelaide’s Paper Arms are rolling nationally with the headliners, and for the next 40 minutes we are all witness to one of the best live bands in the country. Josh Mann is a truly special frontman, delivering political barbs (You Don't Speak For Me) tales of financial struggle (14 Days) and confessionals of broken-down romance (Snake Oil) with a magnetic passion. Surrounding him are bandmates that sing loud, lock in tight, and lose themselves in the music – the overall result being a set you simply can’t walk away from.

Following this, Pennsylvanian heroes Title Fight are the only group that take the stage; however, if you closed your eyes and just listened you’d swear it was two acts going rounds up there. They bring the heat with various straight-ahead riot starters: Shed, 27, Numb But I Still Feel It and Symmetry, but new songs like Murder Your Memory, Chlorine, Hypernight and Your Pain Is Mine Now sound like they’re being delivered by a completely different act. Guitarist Shane Moran is wearing a Robert Smith shirt this evening and it feels totally in line with the band’s current sonic state.

Given the chance, the pit inevitably becomes a tangled mess of limbs, with bodies flying from every corner of the stage. During these periods Title Fight are unresponsive, and they have to be – they wouldn’t get through a song otherwise. But the setlist is designed with peaks and troughs, so things rarely get out of order, though as expected rowdy punters still manage to kick cables loose and knock down microphone stands.

The night’s most fractured moment comes when vocalist/bassist Ned Russin – tired and emotional after the cross-Pacific long-haul – talks us through his present position of growing up and still not figuring it out. He dedicates Rose Of Sharon to himself, and it’s impossible not to take solace in this shared moment of vulnerability. The set then comes to a crashing close with Society, Head In The Ceiling Fan and Secret Society, the front rows practically flattened by the end of it all.

Witnessed live, the tracks from latest album Hyperview seem like a reaction as much as they do a passion. It’s undeniably inspiring to watch a young group take genuine risks with their music – against the predominant wants and needs of their fanbase – and do it with such aplomb.