Patrick Wolf live @ The Zoo

Animal Collective played Brisbane recently.

I'd already spilled a mug of beer of my Pet Sounds CD, so I didn't feel the need to duplicate the effect twice. I skipped across the Valley to where Patrick Wolf was putting on a stadium rock show - three costume changes! - in front of 100 people. He came out dressed in mohair and leather shorts, with knee socks. I'm near certain the reason he was missing for 10 minutes in the middle was cos he was throwing up backstage.

I wasn't sure about the music in places - loved the violins, felt the guitars could have done with a little reining in - but I was sure in awe at his commitment. His management kept trying to pull him off stage. He kept refusing, and played till well after midnight (much to my and Charlotte's chagrin: the babysitter came to over 40 bucks). He played Pop Single Of 2007, 'The Magic Position' right at the close and even I was to be seen joining the Valley girls swinging their handbags, bouncing around.

He was a little bit music school, a little bit Amanda Palmer. He was a lot Goth, but in the beautiful and damned and romantic sense (i.e. in a good way). His hair was miraculous, his dancing only marginally less so. (If I'd been 20 years younger I would have been having wet dreams that night.) He had a great sense of pitch and timing, and never willingly undersold himself. His energy was phenomenal.

I was sold, three songs in. He lost himself in the moment and didn't bother recovering.