Words by: Belinda Quick
Photos by: Justin White
“It’s so strange how life works: You want something and you wait and wait and feel like it’s taking forever to come. Then it happens and it’s over and all you want to do is curl back up in that moment before things changed” – Lauren Oliver, Delirium
Is it the truest sign of maturing to fully appreciate George Bernard Shaw’s adage, ‘Youth is wasted on the young’? The operative word there is true.
For Shaw’s intention was not made with malice or cynicism, it was an observation that while energetic vitality can contribute much, the greatest depth of experience comes from life itself. Full appreciation arrives with time, patience, love, loss, and, if we’re very lucky, from being rekindled.
The grand manifestation of this is, of course, found via and in music. Memories at once made real again simply by the strike of a chord, a revisitation reminds us, this is How It (Still) Works; older but perhaps wiser, the magic is still bottled in this BODYJAR.
A solid Adelaide crowd stand to attention for THE OPERATORS, scores of others indicating I’ll Be Right There after visiting the Bottle Shop bar and scouting the standard stellar skaterpunch merch. Laika onomatopaeic, frontman Riley Finley barks comedically his “thanks for coming out early; is anyone else playing tonight?” The locals achieving their P-Plates off the back of the debut EP, Never Ever Again, there’s no Going Home again; The Operators are sharp, slick and, like Tokyo Rose, made for the wider world’s airwaves.
Party punk institution LOLA explode in trademark style, a sensory and Information Overload powering the blitz attack that embodies a Love It and Leave It approach to life. The wild abandon of youth “all over the shop”, Billy Burns begs the question: What’s the Point, if we’re not having fun? After handing lead duties over to guitarist Sebastian Reyes-Hewett to begin “a long song”, the duetters harmonised screams Tease Me; the quartet immediately Make Things Right, burning through their incendiary set at Fast Life pace with infectious freneticism from onset to Game Over.
The Rocky theme announcing their arrival, pop culture references connect space and time through the musical continuum. Bodyjar begin by Calling Orson, Cameron Baines’ voice like honeysuckle, as they Feed It to the Adelaide audience for the first time since 2023, 25 years since the release of the career-defining album titling this particular tour. “What an absolute pleasure it is to be back in Adelaide”, the lead singer emotes, instantly elevating our collectively Ordinary Lives a little higher.
Feeling One In A Million, the LAF floor reverberates, the fierce drumming of Shane Wakker setting the furious metronome tempo for the Maze runners in the mosh. No Touch Red and no word of a Lie, times may have changed, our bodies are Not the Same but the Sequel just might surpass the original. Just like in the turn of the millennium and on Another Day, Bodyjar need only musicianship to convey their energy; yet, it must be said, years have deepened the experience off stage.
Regrettably Running Out of this set of shared moments, there will be No Surrender except, maybe, to the sweet Sound of the Stereo classics we all remember from our youth. Tonight’s experienced audience almost spent, the major set concluding, Bodyjar bless Adelaide with a tailored encore, guitars raised the players signal to the musical gods, in victory achieved.
Many wise enough today to recognise yesterday’s mistakes, we’re Too Drunk To Drive, elated on imbibement and beats. All Let ‘em Loose once more;leaving everything on the floor and on stage, respectively, all drift on a dream of another day, into the Hazy Shade of Winter outside…
PHOTO GALLERY
THE OPERATORS
LOLA
BODYJAR
