The indie girl's guide to…

Sia
The Metro, Sydney

Wednesday, 25th March, 2009

Last Wednesday I had the pleasure of seeing Sia play at the Metro. It was somewhat of a homecoming gig for the Adelaide-born singer, as she has been living in the UK and America for the past ten (?) years. She hasn’t toured here at all in that time, and you could tell that there were many a die-hard fan in attendance tonight. As previously mentioned I am a newcomer to Sia, having only really known her beautiful track Breathe Me. I wasn’t even going to come to this show, but a few weeks ago I fell in love with her song Buttons and that was it for me. Of course by this time her Sydney show had just sold out, so lucky for me my friend Katherine knows the right people, and got me one of the last remaining tickets.

I arrived to the sounds of the support act, Bridezilla. These young Sydney-siders always have a flair for the dramatic onstage and an interesting dress sense to match. Did we miss Brown Paper Bag, or did they just not play it, I’m not sure, but it is a standout track of theirs. Either way they are always impressive.

Then it was onto Sia. The lights went down and the strange glow-in-the-dark people came out and played my fave Buttons, just like in the clip I posted here. It was a lot of fun and a brilliant way to open the show.

Sia followed this with Little Black Sandals, the opening track off her latest album Some People Have Real Problems. A young girl called Violet was onstage with her, and Sia called her “my backup singer”, and she was indeed. Violet and Sia sang the last few lines of the song together, very adorable. “Okay so that’s all the gimmicks over folks, now its such singing. I’ll understand it anyone wants to leave now”. 

Oh but the gimmicks weren’t over folks, there was one more. Sia showed another talent, this time with sign language. She signed along to the entire song Soon We’ll Be Found.  The rest of the set contained lots of songs off Some People… including her “anti-drug song” The Girl You Lost To Cocaine, Electric Bird and I Go To Sleep.

What struck me most about Sia – apart from the amazing, bluesy voice which was unbelievable live – was that she was really quite funny. She told it like it was – no bullshit. When someone yelled out for a song, she responded by saying “No we aren’t playing that sorry. There’s three songs, then a fake encore, then two more songs”. She was having a lot of fun on stage too, she looked like she was really enjoying the show and quite surprised by the crowd singing along to some of the songs. Sia had an almost child-like voice in between songs, “thank you, thank you” she cooed. I think someone had a sign that said ‘I love Sia’ but I think she read  it as ‘I love Vinnies’. She said, “Aww yeah I love Vinnies too, or the equivalent, they call them thrift stores in America. Sometimes I even say bangs (pointing at her fringe)  – wanker!” So it was quite refreshing to see someone make fun of themselves on stage - how very Aussie!

For the encore someone yelled out for Lentil, and after a quick band powwow she said “Let’s give the people want they want” and then they played Lentil instead of what ever they were actually going to play as the first song of the encore. And lastly to end the night Sia played the rather beautiful Breathe Me, definitely a crowd favourite. The old adage ‘save the best for last’ worked here tonight. Overall I was really impressed by Sia, and if you ever get the chance to see her live I strongly recommend it.

footnote
The show was being filmed for something, probably Moshcam. I’ll keep you posted.

~ by Roshan on March 29, 2009.

Posted in Indie, Live Music, Music, Photography, Pop, Review
Tags: australian, australian tour, indie, live, Live Music, metro, music indie, pop, sia, sia furler, sydney