BLUE collar Newcastle pride, crowd surfing, discarded bras and underwear, inflatable palm trees, confetti cannons, beer baths and full-frontal nudity. Welcome to the full gamut of rock’n’roll hedonism that is a Gooch Palms show.
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However, last Saturday night’s Cambridge Hotel gig felt particularly special. As any long-time resident knows, Newcastle can be a bloody parochial town. “New-cast-le, New-cast-le.” The Knights’ recent lack of success has meant that parochialism is left closeted these days, but The Gooch Palms brought back home town pride in one of the wildest and craziest shows we’ve seen in years.
It was like Newcastle was officially crowning its new delinquent king and queen of rock in Leeroy Macqueen and Kat Friend.
The Gooch Palms had returned home to complete their biggest ever tour in support of their feverishly fun sophomore album Introverted Extroverts. The newly-renovated and expanded Cambridge band room just added to the sense that this show was an “event.”
Before the Gooch Palms hit the stage the audience was suitably warmed up with Novocastrian spirit by two of the city’s best young indie bands, PALS and RAAVE TAPES. The latter drew a large crowd for their concoction of wild pysch-rock as they ripped through Blue Tins, Corridor and Death In Ya Face from their debut EP. New track 2 U also made its Newcastle debut.
Despite living in the US, there’s no LA egos with The Gooch Palms. They remain working class. There were no roadies and they instead set up the stage themselves, which included two inflatable palm trees, with help from RAAVE TAPES and PALS.
The Gooch Palms took to the stage like conquering heroes. “New-cast-le, New-cast-le.” Macqueen wore board shorts and a red and black tracksuit top with his mullet haircut sporting pink tips. Friend opted for a matching tracksuit top, long black shirt and stockings and she kept well lubricated by swigging from a Jamieson whiskey bottle and drinking Tooheys New cans.
It’s apparent the extensive US tours have turned The Gooch Palms into a tight live unit. They understand how to engage an audience, but there remains an unhinged looseness to their performance to maintain its spontaneity. Whether it was Macqueen forgetting lyrics or stopping mid-song on Trackside Daze to almost vomit.
Musically The Gooch Palms embrace the minimalist garage rock of The White Stripes, the lo-fit pop punk of The Ramones and the harmonies of The Beach Boys. Macqueen’s vocals have improved immensely and were best displayed on the ‘60s-flavoured Living Room Bop and Invisible Man.
But the most exciting moments were when Macqueen and Friend engaged in call-and-answer tracks like the single Don’t Look Me Up and D.P.B.N.O. There is real chemistry between the couple. While the band’s songwriting has also improved, the oldies remained favourites. Their most Novocastrian song Hunter Street Mall brought the mosh pit to life and had a shirtless lad literally hanging from the ceiling after he climbed up a pole.
To continue the celebration of Newcastle, Friend cheekily announced that the city’s most infamous hero Knights legend Andrew Johns was on the guest list. “Where are you Joey? I hope you’re enjoying the show.”
The Gooch Palms also paid homage to Newcastle’s most famous musical export, Silverchair, by playing a fast-paced punk version of Tomorrow. Even though the majority of the crowd was born after 1994, they sung back “You gonna wait til, fat boy, fat boy, wait until tomorrow,” with gusto.
There was also a sense of pride in Macqueen’s voice when he picked up a bra and men’s underwear that were tossed on stage and said, “See Mum I’ve made it, I have bras thrown at me.”
Last summer Macqueen told the Newcastle Herald he was over the whole nudity gimmick. But their fans aren’t. Two blokes jumped on stage naked during the penultimate Ask Me Why, and never one to be outdone, Macqueen dropped his board shorts.
To finish the 17-song set Macqueen introduced We Get By, a song written about a time when nobody wanted to hear the Gooch Palms. As a naked Macqueen said, the track is no longer relevant. The Goochies have fans on either side of the Pacific, and on the strength of Saturday’s show, they are a Novocastrian treasure.
