Flight Facilities, Haiku Hands @ Thebarton Theatre, Adelaide 31/8/2018
Triple J Unearthed has spawned another genre bending pop hip hop hybrid to make you rethink what seeing a “band” is all about. Haiku Hands originally a three piece from Melbourne and Sydney the take the stage, Now Four girls and an almost invisible DJ, they became more dance troupe cross performing artists with a fun exercise routine thrown in! Sister’s Claire and Mie Nakazawa, along with Beatrice Lewis and Mataya Young start a seemingly endless conversation with the building crowd, they “dared us not to dance” even giving us a left, right, right, left chant to get in sync, they told me “it’s not about you” and let me know that “I could be there bad bitch!”. A host of fun times and funky rhythms abound. These girls were going hard to some great beats laid down with pop synth overtones through the set. Some creative input from friends like Hermitude’s El gusto (not about you!) and a clear passion for performance, these girls bought the party with an unstoppable energy bouncing off stage, especially on the high rotation Jupiter. Haiku hands was an epic warm up to the main journey.
Flight Facilities hit the stage under a cloud of smoke and dim lights. Our two pilots Hugo Gruzman and James Lyell dressed in their respective uniforms about to take us on a journey through a heavenly set. The Sydney Duo stand centre stage, a DJ Booth emblazoned and with logo lit up and pulsing in multi colours. Flight Facilities has enjoyed a stellar run of quality and well-loved singles in the 8 years since there debut release and crowd favourite Crave You hit our ears, as time has passed they have drawn on a huge number of collaborators from across the globe and gelled into a broad sound that moves from electro/house to Sunday arvo chill.
Joined on tour by the remarkable Owl Eyes (Brooke Addamo) performing all female vocals and blessing us with her gorgeous voice on the opening track Need you, she moved across the stage with grace and engaged the crowd in both song and banter. Thebby lapped it up, with some punters dressed the part in their pilot hats and fully absorbed by the experience of Sound and lights, Gruzman and Lyell shifted gears moving to a more traditional dance sound before Owl Eyes again join us for the upbeat Stand Still.
The diversity just kept flying and the versatility of electronic music shone through, samples of Daft Punk Da Funk mixed with Faster Stronger Harder had the crowd smiling and diligently nodding their Heads. The performance flowed through jungle beats, disco and house before Ric Rufio delivered us some Sunshine and the crowd soaked up every ray! The revolving vocalist door turned again with Owl Eyes giving us Arty Boy followed by a crowd sing along to Jamiroquai classic You Give Me Something, energy levels in the room where high as the opening guitar lines of Foreign Language rang out, and when the base kicked in we were deep in a 70s nightclub grooving hard.
There’s so many directions Flight Facilities take you, a high energy dance mash of With You, after a chilled and beautiful Clair De Lune the diversity never ends. Great Tunes kept pumping and the willing crowd was loving every beat. Alongside the previously mentioned singles the set included Stranded, I Didn’t Believe and current single All Your Love. Flight Facilities display a rare talent for making original music that displays a huge breadth of influences, the electronic medium seems to blend it together seamlessly to make a flight that soared high was absolutely memorable.
Live Review by Peter Young