It’s during the opening short film retrospective by Callum Preston that opens Something For Kate’s set that it really dawns just how remarkable an achievement two decades in the music industry is.

Specifically, in the snatches of posters that feature SFK’s name gilded by 90s Aussie contemporaries – the very same major bands that have passed into the history books whereas Something For Kate are here in the flesh to perform the second-to-last show of a national tour commemorating their 20 years in the business.

Powderfinger’s dash lasted just under half that length, Silverchair fell one year short before announcing their “indefinite hibernation”; Grinspoon – two.

For further comparison, Something For Kate’s tenure has outlasted the initial runs of Cold Chisel, Hoodoo Gurus, and the reunited band they recently open for: Hunters & Collectors. It’s as long as the Michael Hutchence-fronted INXS and another six years puts them ahead of Midnight Oil.

So what’s the secret to their lasting success?

Well, to defer to frontman Paul Dempsey – a man whose songwriting pen has inked more than its fair share of profound truths in its time – and his assessment in the opening movie, the Melbourne trio are “a band of friends and family.”

Tonight’s heroic concert sees the audience treated like both.

While most milestone tours are typically bloated exercises in sentimental mythologising or a cynical way to make a quick buck from fans’ nostalgia, Something For Kate’s performance smacks of neither.

Instead, over the course of a marathon three-hour performance of highly commended fan service and career-spanning celebrations, Dempsey, Steph Ashworth and Clint Hyndman (beautifully assisted by touring multi-instrumentalist John Hedigan) showcase roughly a quarter of their entire recorded output over two whip-tight sets.

The first, winding forwards in time, dusted the cobwebs off vintage cuts like ‘Subject To Change’ and ‘Roll Credit’. While being among the lucky punters who already caught “half” of tonight’s 30-song setlist (via SFK’s warm-up show) it was no less of a thrill hearing rarely aired material brought to life again, including a suitably queasy ‘Seasick’, and the brilliant pairing of ‘Hawaiian Robots’ and its natural sonic heir, ‘Down The Garden Path’.

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Even rarer was the material opening the second set; following a brief intermission, Dempsey took to the keys for a gorgeous solo rendition of ‘Back To You’, then dedicating an acoustic version of ‘Chapel St Etc’ to David (a 33-year-old Frenchman who’d travelled around the globe to attend, as Dempsey explains).

Then the show began winding the clock backwards, from 2012’s Leave Your Soul To Science, through to the wider-recognised ‘Déjà vu’, ‘Twenty Years’ and ‘Monsters’, and towards a concluding encore of perennial fan favourites ‘Captain’ and ‘Pinstripe’.

Presenting their career in loosely chronological order was a perceptive move, obviously showing off Something For Kate’s evolutionary progression, but more markedly, it served to show the subtle but striking consistencies; that material decades apart is distinguished by many of the same stylistic elements – off-kilter rhythms, enlightened lyrics, shapely melodies unspooled on jagged guitars – seemingly untouched by the historical trends and contexts from which they’re variously pulled.

For instance, the noisy catharsis of latest single, ‘Star Crossed Citizens’, shares plenty in common with the antiquated ‘Picard’s Lament’. The differences being that the band’s enunciations became more refined over time.

Where the earlier material is more aggressive, it’s because the younger howling Dempsey was yet to better articulate his thoughts and frustrations – the way he does on the latently hostile but brooding ‘Kids Will Get The Money’, the yearning ‘Statues’ or the agitated velocity of ‘Say Something’ (which, in the flesh, sounds like Network’s infamous ‘mad as hell…’ monologue set to music).

It also serves to explain why songs from sophomore album Beautiful Sharks still sound like such a breakthrough, renditions of the lucid title track, ‘Big Screen Television’, ‘Anchorman’, and ‘Before Butterfly’s Wings’ all tempering the caustic with the cultivated.

The three hours also gives plenty of time to observe the band’s crackling chemistry on-stage, a close-knit unit powered by Ashworth’s mercurial bass and the thunderous hammering Hyndman gives his kit. He’s dripping from exertion a few songs in and sends countless drumsticks ricocheting skyward during the course of the evening (several during a crackling ‘Electricity’ alone).

Ultimately, the strength of such an exhaustive commemoration of the threesome’s discography served to vilify Something For Kate’s legacy as a band that proves – to quote Ashworth – that “songs don’t have to be about girls, cars, and rock n roll.”

Indeed, they can be about philosophy, existential angst, politics, escapism, or “quantum events and German physicists,” as Dempsey introduces the transcendent anthem ‘Max Planck’.

Compositions that can explore quizzical enigmas and profound truths yet anchor them to visceral sonic frameworks – marrying the conceptual with the emotional.

Songs that can wrap minds in the cerebral and the ears with all the tenets of great rock music: a love of volume and a good hook as statements of intent.

In short, there’s few less enviable or richer songbooks in Australian music.

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While it’s a catalogue that’s yet to bring Something For Kate quite the same jukebox ubiquity, international recognition, or critical canonisation as some of their national forebears, the successes of their sustained career runs much deeper than the merely commercial or cultural.

Just ask any member of the audience who, like the band, give it their all – mouthing along to every word, applauding like it’s their last show, or queuing for hours afterward for the chance to personally thank the band (and in turn be thanked) at a meet n’ greet in the lobby.

When the trio finally emerge, the snaking lines of diehards spontaneously burst into ‘Happy Birthday’ before Paul, Steph, and Clint take the necessary time to engage with the people who’ve allowed them to be their winning selves through 20 years without compromise.

It’s an authentic, touching moment. One that proves in the hearts, ears, and minds of those that matter most, Something For Kate have earned their status as national treasures.

Don’t worry if you missed this splendid celebration of one of Australia’s finest bands operating at the top of their game, there’s always the next 20 years to look forward to.

Check out the photo gallery from the show.

Setlist:

Set 1

Subject To Change

Picard’s Lament

Roll Credit

Soundczech

Big Screen Television

Beautiful Sharks

Jerry, Stand Up

Say Something

Seasick

Max Planck

Hawaiian Robots

Down the Garden Path

The Kids Will Get The Money

Survival Expert



Set 2:

Back To You (piano version)

Chapel St Etc. (acoustic)

Star Crossed Citizens

Statues

You Can’t Please Everybody, Rockwell

Déjà vu

Twenty Years

Monsters (new intro)

Anchorman

Before Butterfly’s Wings

Electricity

Like Bankrobbers

Higher Than You Think

Working Against Me

Encore:

Captain (Million Miles An Hour)

Pinstripe