Everything Everything, Hayden Thorpe @ The Gov, Adelaide 14/4/2026
British art-rockers Everything Everything made a triumphant return to The Gov for the second time in under two years, bringing with them arguably their finest album to date to celebrate a very special anniversary.
Written in 2014, the world was seemingly a very different place. Crooked elections, terrorist fears, rising nationalism, and a news cycle that threatened to swallow people whole — Jonathan Higgs and co. explored these themes on their most celebrated and complex album, one that has arguably become even more relevant now than ever.
Get to Heaven arrived in 2015 with a thud, shifting the band from quirky indie rockers into a lane of their own avant-garde making.
The night opened with Hayden Thorpe, formerly of the flamboyant and fervent indie band Wild Beasts, who sadly disbanded in 2017. Having never been able to see them live, hearing This Is Our Lot and Palace delicately plucked on his solo electric was a reminder of how powerful Thorpe’s whimsical, yet altogether beguiling, voice can be.
While Thorpe ran the audience a warm bath with his subtle, low-key support set, Everything Everything arrived like a cold shower with album opener To the Blade, complete with a false start that had Higgs exclaiming, “See, we are a real band.”
The band, in their matching yellow suits from the 2024 Cold Reactor video, rattled through the album in no particular order. Blast Doors and Regret followed, but it was the inclusion of the album’s bonus tracks that showed just how prolific the band’s writing was at that time.
President Heartbeat, Yuppie Supper, and Hapsburg Lippp all sounded right at home when performed alongside the core material. The Wheel (Is Turning Now) and its tottering beat was breath taking, while the paranoia of Fortune 500 captured the same political discourse Higgs forebodingly penned about a decade ago.
The band’s harmonies were pitch-perfect as Higgs shifted from frantic falsetto to baritone mid-sentence with ease, while bassist Jeremy Pritchard and guitarist Alex Robertshaw proved impeccable as the backbone of the soundscape.
Distant Past turned The Gov into a dance party before the obligatory singalong of No Reptiles helped wrap up the deluxe version of the album in apt fashion.
Returning for an encore of Pizza Boy, Cough Cough, and Cold Reactor, the band put a pin in its ten-year celebration with style.
Everything Everything didn’t just revisit Get to Heaven — they reframed it. A decade on, its anxieties feel less like commentary and more like prophecy, and in the backdrop an Adelaide pub, those ideas hit harder than ever. If this tour proves anything, it’s that the band aren’t simply celebrating their past; they’re reminding us why it still matters.
And having rarely put a foot wrong since Get to Heaven’s release all those years ago, it’s safe to say they’ll be true to their word when they promise to see us again soon.
Live Review By Sam Kelton