Heading through their list of sideshows before their eventual mega-set at Splendour In The Grass, Foals headlined to a near sold out crowd at Margaret Court Arena on Monday night. The UK math rock outfit played a thrilling ninety minute set highlighted by a number of tracks from amongst their recording career. Joining them were US rock crew Warpaint another group gearing up for a big Splendour set.
The female foursome of Warpaint put on a brilliant opening salvo, matching the expected energy of a band that opens for Foals. Warpaint didn't disappoint as they ran through a number of songs during their close to an hour long set. "Ashes To Ashes" and "Elephants" were set highlights, admittedly though, their entire set was tight never mis-stepping while keeping their rhythm and tone together.
Their high energy set was sadly over to quick, but it easily set up what Foals were soon going to unleash on the massive crowd at the arena. While there wasn’t any major releases of theirs to celebrate, it was great to see the power foursome in Melbourne again.
Foals came out immediately with a point to prove firing straight into “On The Luna”, a new track off of Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost – Part 1, “Mountain At My Gates”, “Snake Oil” and “Olympic Airways” made up the opening part of the band’s set, before a quick introduction to what was going to happen going forward for the night.
It was the perfect toe dip back into Foals’ sound before the rest of the night unfolded. Foals’ slowly unloaded, pulling their songs out with some thrilling solos, coordinating each of the groups strong points. Foals’ lead vocalist Yannis Philippakis was a revelation on Monday night with his high vocals and guitar prowess leading Foals’ through some of the groups largest tracks from over the past decade and while there was an emphasis on some of their more recently released tracks, it was the old favourites off of Holy Fire and Total Life Forever which highlighted the band’s set.
“Providence” went off with a bang, with Yannis coming down to the barricade to stand on top of the crowd and shred through a solo while the band thrashed around on stage in one of the more prominent moments of the set. “Spanish Sahara” was another special moment, with a quality light show accompanying the track, the blue lights mimicking the album artwork of Total Life Foreverthe 2011 album the track released on.
Foals’ encore was an energetic thank you to the fans rolling out missing fan favourites, “What Went Down” including some crowd surfing and a wander through the general admission standing room, before a thundering finish on “Two Steps Twice”. It was an absolute pearler of a performance and easily hyped the band up for a huge Splendour In The Grass set coming up this weekend.
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