On August 2, 2024, the American neo-industrialist outfit HEALTH made their return to Melbourne at the awesome Northcote Theatre. Along for the ride is Brisbane noise pop artist Zheani and Melbourne Ritual industrial duo Karina Utomo/Joshua Wells. The audience lined up their hottest goth outfits for over 2 hours for a chance to see this punishingly beautiful lineup.
JOSHUA WELLS + KARINA UTOMO
Some of you may know Joshua Wells and Karina Utomo from various projects such as Nerve, Kilat or High tension. The duo appeared in recent years to create a mixture of rolling bass SHXCXCHCXSH style electronics (from Joshua) mixed with agonising dissonant screams from Karina. On paper this combination could fall flat and sound like a lot of half hearted improv duos do. However what separates these two is their ability to lock in together with what they’re doing and deliver something unique and (possibly) impromptu, yet essentially seamless at the same time. It really has to be said just how solid these 2 artists are at what they do primarily (electronics and vocals) and just how powerful their performances are live .
Honorable mention goes to the subwoofer used for this show during this set, I thought I could fell my skull rattling in my head when I was taking photos for this one. 10/10
ZHEANI
Next up was the hyper insane pagan dance floor rituals of Brisbanes own ZHEANI. Zheani has exploded onto the international scene in the last few years with her brand of metal influenced hyperpop and has developed a huge cult following.
I won’t lie, I dont get into hyperpop stuff in my spare time, but this set was straight up fun dude, everyone in the crowd was having a great time and dancing, Zheani as a live performer is insanely fun with her diving into the crowd and jumping around, it seemed like she was genuinely stoked to be performing for this crowd and everyone seemed to love it. A legitimately sick time was had and i’ve now had that Bring Wet Cunt song stuck in my head for honestly like fucking 4 days now. Great stuff.
HEALTH
Now was finally time for the main event As Health slowly graced the stage during their walk on music (props for picking the Neon Genesis Evangelion Theme song for that. Health had the whole audience dancing before they played a single note ). The band kicked off the set with pounding electro bangers. Over the next hour the band showcased a mix of songs from their latest album RAT WARS and previous releases from mostly the previous 3 albums.
The atmosphere of the show was great, everyone was enjoying it with the light and sound immersing the iconic northcote theatre in a neon haze of crushing euphoria.
Its no doubt at this point in time Health are absolute masters at what they do and with this live set based around their recent release RAT WARS they seem to be going from strength to strength
All In all it was a fantastic show with all the acts crushing it. If you have chance to see any of these acts. DON’T SNOOZE.
ALSO, we were lucky enough to get a chance to interview Jake from HEALTH before the show. Check out the link below to see the interview.
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