PUP, Teenage Joans @ Hindley Street Music Hall, Adelaide 12/8/2025
It was a Tuesday night in Adelaide rock city with quite a few options to go and see but all signs for me pointed to Hindley Street Music Hall for Toronto punk heroes PUP supported by Adelaide’s favs Teenage Joans. I was probably expecting to see a lot more in attendance but those who were there are fiercely loyal supporting their band. It has been a massive year already for PUP touring everywhere off the back of new album Who Will Look After The Dogs?
Teenage Joans got things off to a roaring start with singer and guitarist Cahli Blakers stating “we’re Teenage Joans, we live here!” It might have been a whirlwind set but they were great taking full advantage of their thirty minutes kicking off Sweet Things Rot, Ruby Doomsday and Superglue. The in between songs chat was humorous making them all the more endearing. From cups of tea, to sharing beds on tour because they are poor to Super Duper Twisties it was quite range of topics. Candy Apple, 1800-PAINLESS and Something About Being Sixteen proved popular. Suggesting they weren’t Batman or Robin or hometown heroes or Sia they must be close. My Hearts Dead! and Terrible wrapped a great opening set.
The Baha Men anthem Who Let The Dogs Out set the scene for PUP to walk out to rousing applause letting it rip with No Hope and Olive Garden. Hard to believe that three years has whizzed by since their last tour more than making up for it. Singer Stefan Babcock said
“it’s nice to be back in your freaky arse city, it feels like a Tuesday but by the end it should feel like a fucked up Friday, with Wednesday and Thursday night taking care of themselves”. Adding to that for everyone to take care of each other as they “would find the one percent who suck” that don’t do the right thing. The great songs kept a coming with My Life Is Over and I Couldn’t Be Happier, Free At Last complete with crowd clap-a-long, Dark Days, Robot Writes a Love Song and Concrete. A lone crowd surfer gets things going on Sleep In The Heat. “Feels like a Thursday night already” describes the energy in the room going further saying “being sad and mad and playing these songs seeing people laughing and smiling is pretty cool”. It was great and PUP are a tonne of fun reminding fans of how good they actually are.
Paranoid, Totally Fine and Morbid Stuff were freaking unbelievable and there was a crowd request which they would come back to as they didn’t want to “crash and burn” opting to play it later in the set. With a “tepid” response to Scorpion Hill there was a request to open up the pit on Hallways. Describing some of the lyrics on the first album as “utter gibberish” it was crowd favourites If This Tour Doesn’t Kill You, I Will and DVP that followed. Not being a political band there was a moment before Hunger For Death where Babcock spoke strongly about Trans rights, Trump and free Palestine with the lyric “fuck everyone on this planet except for you.”
Pointing out in response to a crowd request earlier that playing one they “don’t know how to play” was a “total disaster” but that said Guilt Trip was awesome. The cliched saying “time flies” was ringing true as Familiar Patterns made an appearance with Babcock taking a moment to reflect and show gratitude in PUP style saying “I don’t give a shit in the best possible way, we’re counting our blessings”. Our Tuesday night finished on Reservoir and Meltdown. Great show, come back soon.
Live Review By Rob Lyon