Back again in 2011 was the free, all ages Sounds Loud Festival, which concluded National Youth Week. This year’s line-up was a departure from the heavier, more “emo” line-up of recent years and saw an influx of indie bands and use of synthesisers. It started as a beautiful sunny and warm day in Melbourne, which helped to draw a lot of the locals to head down to Queens Park to see what all the fuss was about.

Opening band 23 Angles of Attack gave us their brand of rock to start off the day. The first thing I noticed was that lead vocalist/bassist Christopher Lisati has a nice, clean tonality to his voice that went nicely with their songs. Alternating between guitarists Christopher Spall and Michael Wentworth-Bell, the lead guitar parts were very melodic and catchy, an important element of making 23 Angles of Attack’s songs memorable and having them stay stuck in your head. Sounds Loud was the debut gig of the four piece’s new drummer, Danny Lisati, and I must say that he did a great job and meshed really well with the rest of the guys in the band. I was surprised that they weren’t more energetic on stage, especially when you notice how fast paced their songs are, but being a relatively new band, that will definitely be something that will improve as they play more and more gigs together.  23 Angles of Attack closed their set with a very upbeat song which incorporated a great use of keys with a great tonality, and with a shuffling around of instruments, they were able to avoid sacrificing the bass in this song, which I was very impressed by.

Mindpilot opened their set with a cover of Rage Against The Machine’s “Killing In The Name”, which they did a great job of covering, but I feel it was a bit misleading of what their own sound was. Regardless, it was a great song to show off vocalist/guitarist Tash Sultana’s strong, raspy voice and guitar playing skills. Their next song was a mellow one and features bassist Emily Daye on lead vocals and keys.  Daye’s voice, in comparison to Sultana’s, is much more delicate and clean but suited the mood of the song well. But despite the difference in their tonality, when both are singing simultaneously, their voices blend well together to create a balanced sound. Mindpilot’s original songs showcased the broad range of talent of the members of the band, and were well received by the crowd, evident in the decent crowd reaction that they received.

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