polaroids of androids

Dead China Doll @ Spectrum - 03/10/2008

When I am walking down King St in Newtown and I see Dead China Doll's lead singer Edwin Sheather (it happens every other day) I can't make eye contact. This is not because I am scared of him or owe him an insanely large amount of money, but more due to a bad case of 'the man crush'.

In case my gushing review of their self-titled album didn't give it away - I think the music his band makes is fucking amazing.

Within the six paragraphs of 'gush' I fail to mention just how incredible Dead China Doll are as a live act. The intensity of the music is amplified by about 482 million, largely due to the engaging nature of frontman Eddie. His shyness is obliterated into the far reaches of his psyche (and space) by the raw power of the music that pours out his soul like milk from my nose (after I explode with laughter while watching Australia's Funniest Home Videos). The way in which he becomes powerless to stop the large wave of sound (even with his awesome beard) while still keeping it all within his control is a lovely thing to witness.

Their album launch show last Friday night followed a similar pattern to the previous experiences I have had witnessing them perform. Their set rose to a climatic, no-holds-barred peak (the mind-blowing Face Fuckers Unite For Aids and Rudiger Wilhelm During performed back-to-back) before beautifully imploding into a fury of noise with the shattering of various sounds from all four corners of the stage and the collapsing of the pain-stretched vocals.

It's not surprising that Dead China Doll only play shows every few months. When they finished up their intense forty-five minute set the band looked like they had nothing left. They resembled a gang of wounded rebellious soldiers who had just unloaded their entire energy reverses in fighting the resistance of conformity. If their performance was to be transformed into some sort of futuristic space war television series it would surely be called Blood Skulls Twenty Twenty. That's how they make me feel. It's like the future, but it's also bleak. It still makes me feel warm inside, however, as it's good to know that someone is doing something about all the evil robots that are attacking us.

Comparisons with non-existence sci-fi televisions show aside - I expected this to be a great show and it was. Bravo Dead China Doll. Bravo.