Melbourne International Comedy Festival review by Steve Bennett

This takes me back to my student days of the late 1980s; the alternative disco held in grotty room above a pub with the sticky floors and the walls damp with the sweat of a hundred bodies bouncing awkwardly but enthusiastically to The Smiths, The Cure, The Cult, The Narelles, Joy Division, New Order…

OK, so The Narelles didn’t actually exist, but so authentic is Alan Brough and Casey Bennetto’s sound that they can give you false memory syndrome.

There’s limited comedy in the songs they're debuting here, but the replication of the trends through the 15 years of the band’s alleged lifespan, up to their 2004 break-up, is hugely entertaining. It feels more like rock gig than comedy festival show, even if the largely middle-aged audience don’t quite look like the mosh-pit crowd.

The parodies are affectionate and tend to be generic, although Keating! The Musical creator Bennetto nails the Crowded House sound, and a late song about Nick Cave captures the sultry, mournful tones of his murder ballads perfectly. This Song is more obviously comic, about a band’s dwindling enthusiasm for their jaunty big hit they have to perform night after night – while they end with the crashing rock excesses of the anthem Sex Tape.

Our hosts are clearly musical nerds indulging their passion and enjoying their time on stage. They share vocal duties and switch between who plays guitar and who plays bass between every song (which is going to mean some tangled cables after the gig) while drummer Gary X is so shy you might confuse him for an unseen machine. Droll in-jokes such as this, and the acceptance that the band’s entire history is a fiction, add to the fun – although the mysteries of Shirley Dravinski’s garage are a bit more laboured.

For anyone whose musical tastes are rooted in the post-punk era, this is a rich slice of nostalgia for songs that never actually existed.

Review date: 13 Apr 2015
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
Reviewed at: Melbourne International Comedy Festival