Review By Suze Blacketer
Adelaide has not been short of musical choice lately. This week, coming to us from The Gov, it was the incredible Meg Mac, touring her latest album ‘Matter of Time’.
Starting our evening Ayesha Madon delighted the crowd with her pop peppered songs. A quick Q&A with the crowd revealed that this was Ayesha’s first tour. Even more surprising was that her drummer is actually her brother-in-law, and they were playing together for the first time on this tour.
Starting with one of her earlier releases, Outside of the Party, she bopped around on the stage while engaging with the crowd. Sucked In saw her relax a bit more and Ayesha looked to relax more as the show went on.
Talking to us between songs, Ayesha was open in how her songs talk about mental health issues and how that is something that she is passionate about. Goldfish and Cloud played as those on the floor moved their bodies. Wanting to play a song that the crowd could get around and sing along to, we were treated to a cover of The Climb by Miley Cyrus. All those Hannah Montanna fans got around this one. Showing her prowess on the keyboard and the guitar, Ayesha Madon is someone to keep your eye on as she continues to produce great tunes.
Gratitude for the crowd that had come early to watch her set, Ayesha finished with Future Kinks.
Wall to wall people packed the venue as Meg Mac glided across the stage enshrouded in a sparkling cape. The opening notes of the title track of her album float across the room, the crowd cheering in anticipation. Meg Mac’s silky, emotional vocals wash over us, and the goosebumps begin. Following on with Turning bodies begin to sway and little pockets of space become the place to dance.
Meg greets the crowd and thanks them for coming, saying how she was sorry that she didn’t get to come here on her last tour. The crowd gave an audible sigh as Meg went on to say how it broke her heart to read the comments and thanked us for selling out this show. This album is a special one as is the tour. As Meg explained she took so long to make this album, writing a complete album only to throw it in the bin and go on to write Matter Of Time.
Something In The Water, which Meg tells us is one of her favourites off the album, is a beautiful powerful song and it is delivered as such. Every face was mesmerized, witnessing something magically spellbinding. Such meaningful and relatable lyrics. Give Me My Name Back and Meg tells a story about how they like to sit on the edge of the stage when singing this one but tonight they couldn’t as we wouldn’t see them! They tried stools but it felt like a Q&A session, so they stood. A beautiful moment at the end of this song was a sisterly hug that had the crowd smiling.
Don’t You Cry was one of my favourite moments from the evening, it is such a beautiful song. Moving on to the Like A Version songs that Meg has done, she tells the story of how she placed a poll on Instagram to see which one we wanted to hear. Sadly, someone booed her on the Sydney leg because they wanted Bridges and got Tame Impala’s Let It Happen which I think was an excellent choice!
Meg tells us how hard it is when you release new music as you need to say goodbye to some of the songs in your setlist and how she had put another poll on Instagram to see what people wanted to hear, surprised that Brooklyn Apartment was requested. She told the story of how she wrote this song while living in an apartment in Brooklyn that had paper thin walls, writing about the people who lived in the building.
Meg’s favourite part of the evening was playing the song Letter, telling us that she spent hours writing the letters to send to all the fans, everyone one of them kissed by her and the constant reapplying of lipstick to make it happen. She also told the story behind the song, of writing a letter to someone no longer in her life and it ended up becoming a song, and how she writes letters to strangers instead!
Known Better and Roll Up Your Sleeves finishing the evening with the clayton’s encore - Meg telling us she chickened out from leaving the stage in case we didn’t clap for her to come back so she just played them!
Meg Mac in a small intimate venue is a magical experience, sprinkled with stories and anecdotes about the songs. I know every audience member truly appreciated how special our evening was.