Last night I attended a concert by the Idea of North at The Governor Hindmarsh in Adelaide, and I thought I'd jot down what I thought before I forgot (or became less lucid :-)
There was a good turnout - I'm not sure how many people the Gov holds, but it was pretty full. Instead of having just rows of seats, they had a more cabaret-style seating arrangement, with mainly small tables spread across the flooring.
This was the second time I'd seen TION in Adelaide, and the 3rd time with Sally in the lineup. The new grouping sounds tighter every time I hear them, and the blending of the voices as a whole does too. I love the sass that Sally brings to some of the more up-beat songs; she injects some energy and verve that really lifts the piece.
The best bit (for someone like me who has almost lost count of how many TION gigs he's been to) was new material! At least a third of the songs across the 2 sets were songs that I'd not heard them perform before, including Secret Love by Doris Day, a ballad version of the ABBA song When All is Said and Done, and a couple others, the names of which escape me. Not only did they do new material, but they also pulled out an old song and gave it a re-airing - Straight to My Heart, a personal TION favourite of mine that hadn't been performed since Naomi joined the group over 5 years ago!
TION love to get their audience involved in the show, and this gig was no exception. Having just returned from an a cappella festival in South Korea, they decided to sing one of their Korean songs, with the audience singing an echo line in the chorus. The audience engaged and got into it, causing the group to exclaim, "You were better than us!" (Andrew Piper: "It took us weeks to learn that!")
In short, the show contained amazing singing, beautiful arrangements, quirky humour, smooth sophisticated performance, and great atmosphere - everything that makes an Idea of North live show the amazing ride that it is :-)
