There was something fitting about seeing La Dispute in a room like Singing Bird Studios. With the band back in Australia touring their latest album, No One Was Driving the Car, the Frankston show offered something a little different from a conventional headline gig. It was close, personal and, judging by the conversations from the stage, a night that meant a lot to the band as well as those who came along.
Brisbane’s Special Features opened the evening, bringing their noisy brand of punk to a crowd that was more than ready for it. Che Guevara T-Shirt kicked things off, while the recently released Fun! arrived just a few songs into the set. With members sharing vocal duties and little interest in a traditional frontperson, they were a fitting choice to open for La Dispute.
La Dispute wasted no time getting into their set, opening with I Shaved My Head before Man With Hands and Ankles Bound and The Most Beautiful Bitter Fruit. Jordan Dreyer’s distinctive delivery remains a huge part of what makes the band so compelling live, moving between spoken passages and desperate shouts as the guitars and drums build around him.
It was after those opening songs that Dreyer took a moment to reflect on the unlikely paths that had brought everyone into the same room. More than 20 years into the band’s journey, he spoke about how grateful he was to still be making music with his best friends, let alone doing it in Frankston. ‘We’re on diverging paths leading us all to this moment… twenty odd years later, you’re with your best friends playing a show in Frankston. I’m grateful for the opportunity.’
Scenes From Highways 1981-2009 followed, then Sibling Fistfight at Mom’s Fiftieth, a song about family fights and a welcome inclusion from the new material. The band then slowed things down with Woman (reading), introduced as ‘a love song’.
The response to King Park was enormous. It’s a song that asks a lot of both its singer and its audience, and hearing the story unfold in such a small venue was nothing short of gripping. Moments like this are a reminder of how well La Dispute’s songs translate to the stage, especially with an audience so familiar with every word. Afterwards, Dreyer spoke about the band’s first Melbourne visit in 2009, recalling their show at Irene Warehouse and how good it was to return to a similarly intimate space. ‘Nice to see the faces of people who would otherwise be excluded.’
I Dreamt of a Room With All My Friends I Could Not Get In was dedicated to Special Features and to a friend, before Andria brought one of the night’s most heartfelt moments. La Dispute have always been a band whose words matter just as much as the music, and Dreyer’s words after the song were no exception. He admitted to being nervous about speaking, but vocalised about how much spaces like this mattered. ‘There’s a reason we all found a home in punk rock… in a place that encourages growth… protect this, protect each other… life’s too precious to care about the fascists.’
Environmental Catastrophe Film kept the intensity high before the band closed on Such Small Hands. It was the shortest song of the night, and a perfect finish. Promising to see us again soon, La Dispute left a room full of people who’d just been reminded why this band means so much to them.
On this visit to Frankston, the songs and their delivery were excellent, but it was the band’s appreciation for the people and places that have supported them that stayed with us long after the night ended.