Kim Salmon and the Surrealists
w/The Stabs
Northcote Social Club
Saturday, August 21

Election nights generally provide for interesting events. At an election party in Adelaide in 1993 – when John Hewson threatened to dismantle the social and political fabric with his free market discourse – a television set was burnt in the back yard in a symbolic (and profoundly stupid) gesture. (Pouring water on the flaming set didn’t help matters either.) In Canberra in 1996, tensions ran so high that I picked a fight with a friend, imbibed beyond the call of duty and woke up in a house I neither recognised nor remembered entering.

After the euphoric scenes of 2007, election night 2010 promised surprises – the size and shape of which weren’t clear. Living in an accurately described by a friend as “The People’s Republic of Darebin” clouded the election experience: the swing to the Greens in the inner-northern suburbs of Melbourne suggested we do, in fact, live in a socialist enclave.

I delayed my exit to the Northcote Social Club to witness the Greens’ Adam Bandt’s victory speech in the seat of Melbourne, but made it in time for The Stabs, whose set was shambolic in the extreme.

Each song stumbled to a conclusion like a drunk meandering aimlessly in search of shelter. Bass player Mark Nelson’s amplifier blew up mid-way through his set; his requests for technical assistance remained unrequited, provoking both verbal and physical retaliation. Brendan Noonan’s demeanour seemed to ebb and flow between bemusement, frustration and anger. Matt Gleeson, looking resplendent in full beard, held the loose strands of the set together like a man repairing a suspension bridge with a ball of twine. Yet, perversely, this was the perfect set for the evening: a sense of chaos and near-implosion had provided the backdrop to recent political events. The Stabs were in tune with the political zeitgeist, albeit subconsciously.

Putting aside Kim Salmon’s prototype in London, The Surrealists came of age in the late 1980s when Bob Hawke was prime minister and the power brokers of the NSW right exercised executive – and, it must be said, relatively competent – control on the machinations of the Commonwealth government. By the time the first iteration of The Surrealists started to welt under the weight of substance abuse and ego, Hawke’s grip on power had loosened considerably, and when Paul Keating was dealt a knock-out blow in 1996, so too had The Surrealists exhausted their initial streak of creativity.

Unlike the ALP, Kim Salmon’s Surrealists concept is back in full swing this year. Salmon’s focus tonight was the launch of the vinyl edition of the Surrealists’ recent Grand Unifying Theory. As expected the set weighed heavily toward tracks from that release – ‘Turn, Turn’, ‘Predate’ (which dates back to Salmon’s proto-punk era in Perth alongside Roddy Radalj) and the 25-minute title track – but there were also periodic trips into The Surrealists’ back catalogue for ‘I Fell’, ‘Gravity’, ‘Desensitised’ and ‘Je Taime’.

Throughout it all, Salmon was ably supported by his backing band: Phil Collings on drums, Stu Thomas on bass and increasingly ubiquitous collaborator Mike Stranges, whose efforts on the triangle during ‘Grand Unifying Theory’ did much to enhance the reputation of that oft-derided instrument. The night finished with a typically stirring rendition of ‘I’m Keeping You Alive’. In light of Tony Abbott’s religious views, Salmon’ blasphemous declaration of divinity took on a particularly pertinent quality.

by Patrick Emery

+