Flight Facilities pull out John Paul Young to end their party in the park with Love is in the Air
COULD this be the start of another comeback for John Paul Young? He’s just played to 15,000 Gen X’ers with Flight Facilities in Sydney.
WHEN Sydney dance duo Flight Facilities triumphed at their one-off show with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra last October it was a minor miracle.
The pair were knee-deep in promoting their debut album Down to Earth and there was the slight issue of translating all their songs into classical scores to make it orchestra-ready.
They shoehorned a year of preparation for the show into six months, effectively having to rewrite their songs for the bespoke performance.
Deadline-pushing aside, the resulting show was a genuine event; Italian composer Davide Rossi provided a truly sympathetic score that propelled their songs into a whole other dimension.
The resulting live album captured something special — on some streaming services it’s more popular than the original record and it is even eligible for an ARIA voting this year, in the classical section, no less.
Since then Flight Facilities’ Jimmy Lyell and Hugo Gruzman have bonded with Rossi to such an extent they’re now writing together.
It was a logical, if costly, conclusion to bring their orchestral show home, this time with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and Rossi was back in town to conduct lightning striking twice.
At Saturday night’s sold out show at the Domain as the money shot at Sydney’s Red Bull Music Academy Weekender, Lyell and Gruzman looked surprisingly comfortable in their cockpit perched over a 50 piece orchestra and 15,000 fans.
It’s a massive, brave and wildly expensive undertaking — classical musicians work on the clock but you also get what you pay for.
As with Melbourne, there were no introductions — a nod to the classical world — as guest singers just came on, did their job, and walked off. The ‘Sydney, light up your phones’ refrain from Owl Eyes was more of a nod to the modern musical world most of the audience were more familiar with.
The SSO probably aren’t used to their regular audiences chatting through those pesky quiet interludes, but the whole show straddles a line between elegant orchestration and classy disco with strings attached. And in the case of Dream in the Desert, lashings of sax. It’s also presumably the first orchestral experience for many ticketholders — a smart business move by the SSO.
New addition Michaela Baranov has been touring the globe with Flight Facilities this year. First spotted on The X Factor, at the Domain she handled two of FF’s biggest tunes with precision care. And not a smidgen of stage fright. 2 Bodies (sung in Melbourne last year by original vocalist Emma Louise) is stunning with an orchestra, while early single Foreign Language (originally with George Maple) has all the Studio 54 disco strings in its DNA polished up a treat by Rossi.
Flight Facilities’ most frequent flyer Owl Eyes easily plugged back into fronting an orchestra, as if it was just another night at work. Heart Attack is arguably the best FF song already, but it rockets into a shimmering disco orbit given the full SSO treatment. Rossi’s score isn’t just adding token trombone or violin parts, these songs have been transformed into posher cousins of their original selves — it’s like they’ve been to deportment school but still kept their cool edge.
Pics & review of @FlightFac's colossal show with @SydSymph last night: https://t.co/ns2KmvzBqI @ThisIsOwlEyes pic.twitter.com/L9I1Qsm9I1
— Life Without Andy (@LifeWithoutAndy) September 11, 2016
Owl Eyes gets two of the night’s biggest moments — the fired-up audience were on banger-watch all night, but the tender Clair De Lunegot the most intense reaction — and it’s even more intimate in full classical mode. When the orchestra finally flexes their muscle it’s jaw-dropping.
And Crave You is another tease that they couldn’t get away with in clubland — the strings elevate the drama for a good four minutes before the beats finally drop in.
There were a few cosmetic changes from Melbourne. National treasure Katie Noonan was back to turn Apollo into an instant goosebump moment, but this year they’d delicately woven in Pure Imagination from Willy Wonka as a tribute to Gene Wilder. The show doubled as an education into the power of angelic vocals and classical touches applied to quality dance music. There’s no lazy autotuned and generic EDM here.
American Reggie Watts wasn’t around to perform his Sunshine, with another FF regular Surahn subbing in for him.
Feel-good finale 1: all the vocalists return for Shine a Light. But the night’s not over just yet — sorry Mike Baird.
Feel-good finale 2: As a hometown treat, John Paul Young (who the FF boys have been working with on a new project) delivered the perfect encore — Love is in the Air. No irony, no stunt casting — just FF getting one of our best singers to perform one of the best songs Australia’s ever spawned. And the rapturous reception among the 20 somethings demonstrates again it’s a timeless classic. JPY also seemed quite chuffed to play the song with a full orchestra.
While it’s an expensive expedition, it’d be hard to imagine Flight Facilities not wanting to make this an annual special occasion. And credit to them, one album into their career, for having the tunes and panoramic vision to pull it off. Again.
And it was all over by 10pm, because it’s Sydney.
Now that’s really music to Mike Baird’s delicate little ears.
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