Although the Old Oak's carpets, discolites and fake pine trimmings are hardly obnoxious by toilet circuit standards, as a venue for a band mainlining on sheer frazzled, scuzz-energy like THE D4, it's potentially nigh on horrendous.
Indeed, lesser bands would fold up within minutes in this eau de Karaoke, Miller-promoting-freebies atmosphere, but - as their "6Twenty" album and its' attendant singles have proved - shrinking like wilting violet losers has never been on the agenda for Auckland's THE D4.
Of course, most of our Antipodean heroes down the ages have come through this way, and THE D4 have clearly served a hard-nosed apprenticeship smashing the living daylights out of bars like this. Announcing their presence with a pummelling, gut-wrenching "Rock'n'Roll Motherfucker", this quartet have one thought only: to make us dance like epileptic chimpanzees and take the town in the process.
The songs come thick and fast: a crunching "Come On" gets obliterated by the down on your luck boogie "Running On Empty" and the dirty, SHADOWS OF KNIGHT-style stomper "Ladies Man." Drummer Beaver is already disappearing into a pool of sweat, lank hair and flailing limbs, while singer/guitarist Jimmy Christmas whirls around, staring madly and flinging choruses at us like they're strychnine-laced custard pies.
Bassist Vaughan, meantime, takes on the John Entwistle mantle, keeping his head down and summoning up the four-string muscle while all hell breaks loose around him. He exudes a Zen-like calm as guitarist Dion goes into overdrive and pogoes off the monitors.
Actually, the last place Dion wants to be most of the time is the stage. He piles out into the crowd during most tunes, climbing on hands and up statues and - during "Ladies Man" - easing himself up onto the balcony overhead.. You can sense he's considering a Jimmy The Mod-style swan dive, but decides against it, sliding back down and barely missing a beat.
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The set speeds on relentlessly (ballad? Ha - what wormhole are you living in?) and changes up to a dangerous fifth with a no-nonsense brick wall tumbling assault on new single "Get Loose". Beaver celebrates this triumph by taking an enormous swig from his bottle of cognac. The set ends with the crowd going moshpit mental and factions trying to join the band onstage for "John Rock" and a synapse-snapping "Party." During the inevitable encore of Johnny Thunders' "Pirate Love" only Beaver and Vaughan remain onstage most of the time and your reviewer gets the feeling that if his kit was portable, Beaver would play hanging from beams too.
Barely 45 minutes after the first windmilling chord they're gone leaving us sweat-soaked, energised and a gibbering mess. To say it's been a blast is something of an understatement.
So, yeah, THE D4 may be nothing revolutionary in terms of integrating styles or pushing envelopes. Also, it's undeniable that most of their following (me included) love 'em for picking up THE RAMONES' abandoned baton. Onstage and on record, however, they sound like the latest 'n' greatest in a line of fabulous Australasian heroes (tonight they remind strongly of THE NEW CHRISTS especially) who just shrug off fashion and concern themselves with connecting at head, heart and crotch level.
All three were bullseyes tonight, just in case you had any lingering doubts.
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