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The Go-Betweens / The Laughing Clowns
— The Venue, 14 September 1982

A showcase evening for a pair of Australian groups, and the Venue is half lit, half empty and halfway to the grave. Tailor-made for untheatrical outfits to capsize tragically beneath the weight of all that indifference. The dancespace distance separating stage from seats must seem like 200 miles, with only a handful of Convulsion Hustle exponents to populate the bare-boarded desert. About one dozen of these personages wave their ill-organised physiques (nothing personal, just an unlovely eyeful) to the laudable Laughing Clowns. Such token support could shatter a sensitive soul’s confidence forever, but Laughing Clowns are game.

From their sad eyes and secret smiles and anti-showtime demeanour, I’d reckon these people have read too many upsetting books. Hence they’re a little too tainted against the dross of the world to make an easy, or overtly joyous, sound. Laughing Clowns are one tense but economical drummer; one stand up bassman in a passionate clinch with his instrument, stage left; a fair-headed lad with an itchy guitar and voice box; and, crucially, a horn duet, one boy one girl, playing unified sweeps and hot punctuations of the Memphis persuasion.

Their rhythmic backdrop is a rushed, scuttling rhythm-rock. Their sense of timing and space, with embellishments to that Spartan base, suggests a promise of something valuable and unique. Their Every Dog Has Its Day is but one potential treat.

For the intriguing and often exquisite Go-Betweens, the stage-hugging epileptics numbered just a sorry three. Token applause from the rear barely made it to the front, and with every desultory clap, the trio gamely died a little more. A sad affair. Unwilling to project, unable to connect, the Go-Betweens became just two stray scruffs with sloppy guitars and a drummer swallowed in the shadow of her kit. They might have been a mirage or a despairing troupe of ghosts. Every brittle nuance of a Go-Betweens song crumbled into nothing in The Venue’s leaden air. New numbers were unveiled, but failed to appeal as the band hurried clumsily, apologetically towards the close of a hopeless task. A sad impression to take home of a group who, in the drunken claustrophobia of, say, a Rock Garden scenario, make a lot more sense than here.

The solution ? Try to forget. And keep Send Me A Lullaby as close as ever to your deck.