Austra @ Scala, London

6.9.2011

I'm a fan of Domino Records. I've seen only a couple of artists of theirs though (The Kills, Anna Calvi). Last spring whenever I checked their website, I saw the name 'Austra'. Also YouTube kept on recommending me to see their videos. So I watched 'Lose It', which is a fine tune and the video is crazy.



'My face screams without an emotion' - brilliant. Now who hasn't felt that way sometimes?

I had listened to some more songs, but still it was only about liking them. So, I wasn't sure whether I should have gone to the gig or not.

I knew that I would have regret not going. And also last year I missed Mumford&Sons in Holland, because I didn't have the courage to go to Amsterdam right on the first week. But hey at least this gig was still in the same city.

Luckily there were still tickets left at the door, when I got to Scala straight after work. And what a coincidence to meet Finnish people waiting in front of the doors as well. Even bigger coincidence for them to live in the same area as I.

I went to stand as front as I could, and when the cool warm up band 'Kool Thing' started to play, this guy in front of me asked if I was ok and if I wanted to get on first row. I told him yes, I'm a bit too short for this. He agreed with me.

I wonder how many people like to play with the words cool and kool, when talking about the band. And how many get annoyed of having Sonic Youth's song 'Kool Thing' pop up first and more often than the band in Google. Anyways, this duo consists of an Irish and Australian, who formed the band in Paris and live now in Berlin. Kool. Apparently they also like Finnish people. Kool. They play kool music. Kool.

this was the best pic i got of them. kool. sorry.

 When Austra started to play I didn't even realize it, since the singer got on stage first and other members got on one by one, when it usually is the opposite. And now what could I say about it? It was great, but great is not enough of a good word to describe how good it actually was. The band as a whole is just something unique, and it gives a good feeling when watching them.

always wondered how a gig panorama pic would look like

And to the actual music! The base melodies were so catchy and made you dance, though the weird thing is that I never concentrated on them that much when listening to the album. Same thing with the drums! And the singing, the piano, everything! The album sounds even better now.

It was really nice to be able to get pictures afterwards with great musicians.

you might recognize this duo from the red picture

I was about to catch the tube and go home sleep, but surprisingly the Finns convinced me to go to the official after party. Never been to one of those, so it was interesting to see. And take the taxi for the first and second time in London (now how useful was it to bump into Finns living in the same area).

Well, it was the best last minute decision that I've ever made to finally go to the gig. I had a great time.



There was only one video on YouTube of the gig, and it was too short. So I decided to put one from their older gigs. This is also a great tune, and actually the only time the English crowd went a bit crazy (really disappointed how conservative they were).