The Fearless Vampire Killers at The Toff in Town, Melbourne

Jess O'Callaghan checked out Melbourne's The Fearless Vampire Killers, as they played a gig in their home city. Fiona Wilde supplied the photos, taken at their recent Sydney show:

“We cleared back the tables. When we play this next song, you’ll understand why.” The Fearless Vampire Killers are not a band to see if you don’t want to dance. These Melbourne blues rockers are the epitome of boogie. They were actually making my shoes bounce with the beat, even to the songs I didn’t know.

Melbourne six-piece Major Tom & the Atoms' set was an energetic start to the night. They make the saxophone look as cool as it did when Rob Lowe played one in St Elmo’s Fire (very cool). Rhythm and blues, soul funk and sexy crooning warmed the crowd right up for The Fearless Vampire Killers, and set the tone for the rest of the evening. Wasteland was the aforementioned table-clearing number, and it had most of the packed-out dance floor swivelling their knees like 1960s rock and roll stars. Moving seamlessly between pop-rock, funk and soul, The Fearless Vampire Killers are like something out of another decade. With their bright orange shirts and gel-quiffed hair, the four Melbourne boys looked the part.

With sounds simular to Little Red and The Drums, The Fearless Vampire Killers have songs that will get stuck in your head for days. In a good way. They make me want to barbeque things by the beach and then go swimming in my clothes. They sound like summer, but not in a happy-go-lucky, too cheerful way. In a way that means great, rolling riffs can be mixed with lyrics like, "Most people I know, they think life’s for living/But you know what I say, life is for killing." And still make you want to boogie.

As always, the Toff in Town is a perfect place to see any band that makes a live gig feel a bit like you’ve discovered an ability to time travel. The candle-lit, velvet-curtained band room is perfect for a band like The Fearless Vampire Killers. Try and catch their upcoming gigs in Geelong, Ballarat and at the Apollo Bay Music Festival. They’re definitely best enjoyed dancing.

Review by Jess O'Callaghan. Photos by Fiona Wilde.

Getting To Know... The Fearless Vampire Killers

Guitarist Al Marx from Melbourne's The Fearless Vampire Killers tells Bobbysix.com a bit about the band:

The Fearless Vampire Killers are a really complementary group of people. Justin is the loveliest person you'll ever meet, Jacob is the most solid person I know, Sean is a boy in a man-suit, and I'm passionately flawed. We actually have quite divergent musical tastes. Though I feel we appreciate the same qualities in music, our different personalities interpret them in different ways so the music we personally enjoy can be quite varied. When we write, we all get to the same point down different avenues which I feel is one of our greatest strengths.

We like to write lyrics when we're feeling emotionally stressed. Not for some wanky pseudo-intellectual expression of pain, but simply because your reasoning is out of balance, and you see your viewpoint from a different angle. It makes it more interesting for the both of us. We can't really account for our musical inspiration. It's just a big pile of everything we've liked over the last 23 years and when we're looking for a melody something usually pops out. It's best not to wonder where it's been.

Our debut album is done! We actually recorded 95 percent of it two years ago. We had so many pathetic little setbacks along the way, but now it's sitting there on the shelves. It's a great relief to have the final product after much fluffing-about and be in a position to do something with it.

Melbourne is our home and I think it always will be. It's pretty hard to put my finger on it, but I think Melbourne is a very light-hearted city. Everyone seems to get on pretty well and there seems to be less social pressure than most other cities I've been to. You can just be what you are without the pressure to state what you are.

It might surprise people to learn that we don't surf. Many people ask us that, particularly north of Canberra. We love the beach and getting thrashed about by the waves, but frankly Victoria has less of the warm sunny paradise waves and more cold ferocious waves peeling off from the endless swirling chaos of the Southern Ocean. That doesn't make the learning process very appealing.

Our album launch at The East Brunswick Club this Saturday will be fantastic. I swear. Your performance is always susceptible to little distractions and your gigs can suffer because of that. But I feel this gig is going to be a massive sigh of relief for all of us. It's the end of a chapter and we'll be pulling it all out. It's like an enormous group therapy session you can watch through the suspicious mirror on the wall.

Interview by Bobby Townsend. You can find out more about The Fearless Vampire Killers at their Facebook page. They launch their album at the East Brusnwick Club on Saturday 26th November.