The sight of Enmore Road tonight was a sea of school aged punters showing copious amounts of butt cheeks and puppy fat. “I obviously didn’t get the memo to wear denim hot pants to The Kooks tonight” was my very ‘clever’ status I posted on Facebook. I entered The Enmore Theatre and reminded myself that I’m getting too old for all-ages gigs at a quarter of a century old.
These thoughts soon dissipated during sound check as I sipped on my pink lemonade and towered over the teens around me. The DJ spinned olden goldies including ‘Brown Eyed Girl’ and ‘I’m Walking on Sunshine’, to my amazement the entire venue broke out and sang-along blissfully while practicing patience and good-behaviour. At that moment my faith in teens had been restored and the euphoric mood in the room began to set in.
The Kooks burst onto the stage and got straight into it. They opened a gorgeous pop and endorphin-rich set with ‘Ooh la’ from The Kooks debut album. Lead singer Luke Pritchard promised that the band were going to honour their ‘older stuff’, which The Kooks followed-through with, and he declared his love of Sydney to the roaring affection of the crowd.
Luke delivered his flirty frontman antics from early on in the set and pursued it for the next hour by dancing, working the crowd, and winking at the blushing girls in the front row. The majority of the set included their best sing-a-longs and reminiscent favourites from ‘Inside In/Inside Out’ and ‘Konk’. It was obvious the romantic pop of ‘She Moves in Her Own Way’, catchy hooks of ‘Eddie’s Gun’ and summery vibes of ‘Sofa Song’ and ‘Always Where I Need To Be’ were crowd favourites, as the phone screens and voices raised into the air in unison. The Kooks teased the pubescent crowd with ‘Do You Wanna’ which includes the lyrics “Do you wanna make love to me?”. No undies were thrown on stage but there were plenty of screaming girls (and dudes) who were nodding in agreement.
The Kooks changed up the tempo throughout the set amongst the danceable pop, adding in a whimsical acoustic of ‘Seaside’. They also delivered an electrifying performance of their unreleased track ‘The Saboteur’ (supposedly popular on Youtube), which required a heightened level of instrumental complexity. Kudos, Kooks!
Usually by three-quarters of the way through a set I begin to yawn, but the band were so engaging and the sound was so luscious that I ditched this ritual to jump around and clap in utter admiration of the band, just like the teens around me.
Some of the kids thought all was lost once the band wished “Goodnight” after a fifteen-ish track-long set, but the band delivered an encore of two of their most successful singles- ‘Junk of the Heart’ and the emotional heart-breaker ‘Naïve’. The latter was definitely the favourite song of the night for the crowd and hence, the best was left til last. I have never wished to return to my teen years, though tonight would be an exception. I felt envious of all of the cute teen dates who shared this sweet and innocent gig together, which will be documented on social media to the envy of their friends sitting at home. The Kooks were truly charming and humble tonight. I headed home and promised myself I would not let another five years go between seeing them play again.
