Kilter @ Jack Rabbit Slims
by Alastair Punler
I really discovered and fell in love with the Australian Electronic music movement in late 2014 and ever since then Kilter was a flagship artist for me. His summery happy future bass vibes are a perfect example of the sound that Australia has shaped. Unfortunately, I never got the chance to see him until this past weekend.
I was most excited to see how all his tracks were performed live, and he did not disappoint. It was mesmerising to watch him go to town on the drums for each drop and then to play beautiful future bass chords live in the next phrase. Mid way through his set he played two of his more pop tracks he has right now; Fool for You, and They Don’t Know Us. Even though they are geared more towards the pop audience the drop on They don’t know us definitely pushes all the right buttons for me, with that fat bass reverberating out of the JRS sound system. One of the most impressive displaces of drumming was shown off when he played a cover of On Your Mark by Gregor Salto and Wiwek. Each drop he would speed up the tempo turning the JRS dance floor up notch.
Kilter ended his set and then cheekily bailed backstage, but we called his bluff and knew he was coming back out for one more, surely he was going to play They Say right? Like he wasn’t going to leave me hanging right? Kilter came back out and played Coward which features Ngaiire, although this is a beautiful tune I couldn’t believe he wasn’t going to play They Say as the encore, I was legitimately devastated. As the dreamily melodic tune of Coward came to a close Kilter said his goodbyes and me and some other random punters started begging for him to play They Say. Then he teased us with the briefest stab of the intro saw waves, but the true fans recognized it instantly and Jack Rabbit went off as the legend closed on his huge track, They Say. Well done mate you trolled me good.
Kilter’s live show is not one to be missed, I came in with high expectations and left having those expectations exceeded, and can honestly say it was one best live shows I’ve seen.