I walk into Bennetts Lane (24 February) – a funky, little jazz club tucked away in an alleyway somewhere in the north of the Melbourne CBD – and perch myself on a stool by the wall ready for Bat Country.
There's a yellow, glowing bar off to the right, with jazz albums and fine liquor lined along the wall. It's an intimate, little venue with circular black tables dotted in the centre and a tiny stage up front where a red guitar, double bass, drum kit and a covered piano sit.
The chattering in the dark room dies down as Lincoln McKenzie (guitarist) picks up his guitar and starts fiddling about, tuning and preparing his effects; it seemed to me like he was doing some kind of soundcheck, very nonchalantly making this buzzing, echoing sound like flying creatures coming from the distance then fading back out – quite dark and insidious.
But then he loops the noise and without announcement or a word spoken the other two members take to the stage and roll instantly upon grabbing their instruments into their first song. It was a buoyant kind of song, sticking within the parameters of my idea of normal jazz except for McKenzie's strange guitar loop fading in and out.
Steve Hornby (double bass) was plucking away at his giant, wooden contraption, carving canyons into the air with quick fingers producing slow, yet wonderfully mobile grooves. McKenzie teamed with Steve's sound path playing mainly single-note combinations along the scales rather than chords (to begin with) and Sarah Glades (percussion) kept the boat afloat with her soft bounces and seamlessly fast tapping, emanating a stream of sound like the blood of their musical organism.
The song ends and after a little bit of chat, in which they chastise and read 'ignorant’ exerts from a bad review they got (which makes me a little nervous), they head into their next song 'The Beast Opens Its Jaws / When The World Laughs' and by God is it a shift. McKenzie plays around again with the guitar effects, making some far-out and eerie landscapes for the song's backdrop then lines the mood with some sharp, solo patterns that build into darker-chorded grooves, maliciously prowling as the name suggests.
Then, they all give each other a sly smile and casually drop into an all out, yet harmonious and well timed, complete thrashing of instruments. Hot and heated sounds are bellowing and thundering out as if the very gates of hell had opened; this I'm sure must have been the moment the beast opened its jaws. Then another sudden shift in mood and the noise drops, easing into a sweet, tonal lull with the quiet gentle yelp of the guitar here and there, the fast yet gentle tapping ribbons to the symbols, a slow swaying of the bass. It's like 'okay, shit, you've been eaten and now your just hanging calm and weightless in the beast's big old belly'.
Now from a distance, slow and growing out of the musical abyss, Sarah starts at the drums. Her eyes are closed and she has a wonderful grin on her face, like she truly loves it. The soft noise creeps; your head bobs along to her tight-wire balance and timing as it accelerates beat by beat into an absolutely delicious, powerful frenzy, incomprehensibly fast; and then its drops back out amidst the claps of the crowd into a soft, sweet riff, with Mackenzie's eerie guitar effects coming in once again and bringing it to an end with a lovely, light, jazzy happy ending. I was sufficiently impressed after that and they seemed to be loving it up there doing their thing.
After a bit more talk and bagging out of that terrible review they carried on with the gig, exhibiting throughout the sheer diversity of sound they are capable of. All their songs were lined with sudden changes and surprises. They are a well-made synthesis of improvisational jazz and experimental semi-psychedelic hard rock.
They are all extremely talented musicians but it was McKenzie's wide and spooky guitar range that had complete control of the mood like the head of a snake, giving the band an extra dimension that makes them stand out as something different and hard to define.
