Fires of Waco + Headaches @ Browning Street Studios

The venue

awk·ward, adjective

1 obsolete : perverse
2 archaic : unfavorable, adverse
3 a : lacking dexterity or skill,  b: showing the result of a lack of expertness
4 a : lacking ease or grace  b : lacking the right proportions, size, or harmony of parts
5 a : lacking social grace and assurance  b : causing embarrassment
6 : not easy to handle or deal with : requiring great skill, ingenuity, or care

Riding in a full elevator is awkward. Finding out your boyfriend’s mum is about to become your step-mum is awkward. But somehow, spending a hot afternoon crammed into a small room with forty other people and watching melodic punk bands play wasn’t awkward at all.

It was special though; Fires of Waco and Headaches formed from the remains of Brisbane’s best-ever melodic punk band The Gifthorse, and both bands were clearly stoked to be playing together again.

Browning Street Studios runs out of a converted workers cottage in West End, and shows there have the best aspects of a house party (BYO booze, no door bitches or security) without any of the nasty consequences (morning after cleanups, randoms in your bed, losing all your bond at the end of the lease).

Alan from Fires of Waco summed it up nicely:

“I don’t mean to rag on the bands that play bigger venues, but I’d much rather be squashed up with ten people in a room like this than play a big club and have ten people up the back feeling awkward.”

The crowd

Luke, Fires of Waco

Alan and Stevie, Fires of Waco

Headaches

Headaches +beer

For more photos go to my Flickr.