Penny Ikinger
Wet Suits
Simon Cox
@ the Excelsior Hotel, Surry Hills, Sydney
Friday, November 9 2001The original billing for this show had the Wet Suits opening, followed by Louis Tillett and then Penny Ikinger at the top of the bill. Unfortunately Louis had to be replaced at short notice due to illness, so Simon Cox was recruited in his place. Personally, I'd never heard of him; or rather I had, but then he turned out not to be Died Pretty's drummer after all...
Given that in the past Vanilla Chainsaws fans have had to cope with two Peter Kellys in the band at the same time, while Melbourne has its pair of Richard Stanleys, both of whom have their own record labels, Sydney can probably cope with a multiple Simon Cox situation. Apparently he mainly circulates in roughly the same sort of circles as Louis (e.g. Jackie Orszasky, Don Walker, etc), though perhaps a little closer to the cabaret side.
Despite a delivery and a repertoire that makes you assume he must wake up on the tiles fairly regularly, probably even face down in the ashtray (or does that only happen to me?), he worked his way steadily through a very assured set. He has a voice that seems to derive from many more years of hard drinking and hard living than is evident in his appearance. Clearly he's years younger, but look away for a second and it's easy to picture yourself transported to a sad Las Vegas cabaret night at a lonely truck stop cum roadhouse somewhere along the road to Coober Pedy, or perhaps amidst the endless miles of empty plains between Ceduna and Kalgoolie; where the walking wounded from the surrounding region intermingle with passing strangers dog tired from long hours on the road, all nursing the shattered hopes and crushed aspirations of their failed lives, along with a few beers and the occasional shot of something harder on the side.
The organisation of the gig itself seemed a little "relaxed" during his set, so he just adopted the approach of singing a few songs, then asking whether they wanted him off the stage yet; when there were no takers from the audience and no contrary indication from the management, he'd continue. Eventually he was given the nudge by someone from the Wetsuits, but since he'd been able to continue pulling numbers out of the bag with casual aplomb, right up to that moment, it left me wondering how much longer he could happily have continued before ultimately running dry.
Next up were the Wet Suits; Stephen "Bones" Martin fronting yet another of his surf music combos. He sure does seem to love the surf and there's no denying his ability with the guitar, but surf music is something I prefer to take in small doses. Fortunately the Wet Suits' repertoire also included a few surprises and instead of burbling along with, or over the top of, the guitars, the keyboards added some extra garagey punch to the instrumentals, which were not completely surfed out and sun drenched. You might say that this was a sort of surf punk, only without so much punk.
Sure we got the usual Wipeout/Bombora/Pipeline/...whatever..., but they spiced it up with some unexpected gems (at least unexpected to those like me who had automatically ignored their very recent album on Citadel), including a cover of one of the earliest and unquestionably the most recognisable pieces of electronic music ever recorded (I'm referring of course to the Dr Who theme tune) as well as the theme from "The Munsters", though their version had much more of a "rondo" feel to it than the original.
Then it was time for the "Songs From The Deep" EP to get well and truly launched. Starting off with "Spinster", which isn't on the EP but is available on her web site (www.pennyikinger.com, though the MP3s do change from time to time, so you might need to grab it a bit sharpish), Penny then gave us on a comprehensive exhibition of the range and repertoire to expect on her forthcoming album. This included all three songs from the EP, with Dave Morris from the Celibate Rifles supplying some extra electric guitar on "Kathleen" as promised earlier in the day during our interview, while Simon Cox provided the keyboards on "Sponge Diver" and Jim Dickson helped out with the backing vocals (both tasks originally handled on record by Louis Tillett). These were both highlights of the show, as was the final "Poison Berries", which was played as the encore.
Given that "Poison Berries" was also one of the highlights, it's surprising that initially it didn't look like we were going to get it at all. The band were acting as if the set was over and Jim had even stepped out to the bar, but the enthusiastic cries for more continued so, when he returned glass in hand, he sauntered back up onto the stage, the rest of the team reassembled and then let rip with it.
She did seem a little nervous to start with. Since she'd mentioned before that she does get jittery before gigs, I was on the lookout; I'm not sure if it would have been at all obvious otherwise. There were also a few occasional minor distractions, due no doubt to this not being a group that performs together on a regular basis. However the core trio represented by herself, Jim Dickson on bass and Nick Fisher on drums certainly has logged a lot of joint flying time over the years and the interplay between them is pretty intuitive. At least that's the way it comes across to someone in the audience and it is unlikely that there is any better rhythm section in this country than Messrs Dickson and Fisher, as they have proven conclusively on numerous occasions over the years. As the show was being recorded, it will be interesting to see whether any of this performance makes it onto the final album. I certainly hope that this rhythm section is represented on at least one of the more aggressive numbers.
1/2
