Reviewed on Saturday September 6
Modular’s most promising talents Movement took to the stage at Newtown Social Club for the first of a string of sold-out Australia shows. Hype for this Sydney outfit is at a crest right now, having just been added to Banks’ upcoming North American tour dates and, even more notably, the lineup for Pitchfork Music Festival in Paris.
Vocalist Lewis Wade sounds incredible on the recordings – a deep, soulful husk over sparse beats in a marriage not unlike SBTRKT and Sampha. Comparatively though, Sampha’s voice is more delicate than Wade’s, and the incredible power in Wade’s vocals come through in a live setting. Using two microphones doused in reverb and delay, it’s clear why Movement have made such huge strides so quickly – Wade’s voice is one of the most special things in Australian music right now.
The group’s nocturnal, sexual sound shimmered through the intimate Newtown Social Club; the minimal lighting and closeness of bodies giving the impression that this could in fact turn into an accidental 300-person orgy at any point. Singles ‘Us’ and ‘Like Lust’ were highlights, both the best-performed and received songs of the evening. The repetition of the lyric, “Could you come on over, when this feels like lust?” and the gorgeous build of layers and beats around it made for a really beautiful atmosphere in the room.
An odd outlier in the night happened during the outro of Movement’s newest track, ‘Ivory’. The studio version has a guitar solo at the back of the mix, like a distant flurry that you could almost be imagining – but its live reincarnation was off key, off time and overbearingly loud. It disappointingly snapped the crowd out of the cocoon of chill that the band had so successfully wrapped us in.
Their live show still has creases that need ironing, but this seems to stem from the fact that they’ve blown up so quickly and they haven’t had time to craft their live set. Even so, it was a damn good performance off the back of the vocals alone. At the rate they’re going, Movement will soon be the country’s newest, biggest export.
