Mick Thomas
Where Only Memory Can Find You Album Launch, Memo Music Hall Melbourne Friday 19 May 2023
Review: Nick Corr Photos: Mark Hopper
It was great to have a warm and crowded Memo Music Hall for Mick Thomas and The Roving Commission’s Where Only Memory Can Find You album launch on a very chilly Friday evening in Melbourne.
Opening act The Golden Rail looked great on the big stage and played a tight set of their signature guitar pop. They featured many songs from last years excellent ‘Songs from Empty Streets’ with stand-outs including “Float Like a Feather” and “Big Sky” before closing with their catchy early single “Shouldn’t Get Hung Up About It”.
Since I last saw Mick Thomas play, the Sure Thing have grown with ex Weddings, Parties, Anything and current Tim Rogers and The Twin Set violin player Jen Anderson joining the line-up and opening the show beautifully with a gentle playthrough the melody of “Liliac Trees” before being joined by the full band for the album opener.
Not surprisingly for the album launch, songs from Mick’s great new album Where Only Memory Can Find You featured heavily with highlights including sombre “Shoulder Arms” and the more upbeat “All About The Numbers”, “Rising Sun” and first single from the album “Back In The Day”.
There was also a ton of material included from Mick’s illustrious solo catalogue, including “You Remind Me”, “Our Sunshine”, “Round 14, 2009”, “As You Lay Sleeping”, and guitarist Brooke Taylor taking lead vocals on the calypso “Captain Collingwood” from 2021’s City’s Calling Me.
With the current Roving Commission line-up now including half of Weddings, Parties, Anything with Mick and Jen joined by Mark “Squeezebox” Wallace on accordion and keyboards, the show included a good slab of Weddings classics among them “Away, Away”, “Hug My Back”, “A Tale They Won’t Believe”, “Step In, Step Out” and a show closing “For A Short Time”.
This was one of the first shows of the Where Only Memory Can Find You launch tour, so you can catch Mick Thomas and The Roving Commission across Australia and the UK through May, June and July:
Thu May 25 Acrobar, Heatherton VIC;
Fri May 26, Sat May 27 & Sun May 28 It’s Still A Secret, Brisbane QLD;
Fri Jun 2 and Sat Jun 3 Camelot Lounge, Marrickville NSW;
Fri Jun 9 Mojo, Fremantle WA;
Sat June 10 and Sun Jun 11 Lyric Lane, Perth WA;
Sat Jun 17 & Sun Jun 18 Wheatsheaf, Adelaide SA;
UK DATES:
Fri Jun 23 Castle Theatre, Wellingborough UK;
Sun Jun 25 Left Field Stage – Glastonbury Festival, Glastonbury UK;
Mon Jun 26 The Thunderbolt, Bristol UK;
Tue Jun 27 The Welly, Shoreham-By-Sea UK;
Wed Jun 28 Café #9, Sheffield UK;
Thu Jun 29 The Kitchen Garden Café, Birmingham UK;
Fri Jun 30 The Water Rats, London UK;
Sat Jul 1 High Wycome, UK;
Sun Jul 2 In The Garden, London UK;
Mon Jul 3 The Workman’s Club, Dublin IRE