The Chills- Silver Bullets Tour

The Chills burst onto the scene in the US in the early 1990s with the albums Submarine Bells and Soft Bomb and exemplified the sound of the Flying Nun record label. Lead singer/songwriter Martin Phillipps is the sole remaining member of the original band, and after years of dealing with health issues he is back with the fantastic new album Silver Bullets. As a long time fan I was thrilled that they were playing a show in Melbourne, as the last time I saw them live was in Auckland at the millennium concert with Split Enz.

I arrived at Max Watt's (the former Hi-Fi Bar) right before they took the stage. The set list was a mix of songs from throughout their career. They played most of the tracks off of Silver Bullets, including my favorites "Aurora Corona," "I Can't Help You," "Silver Bullets," "When The Poor Can Reach The Moon" (the second half of "Pyramid") and the brilliant "America Says Hello." We even got a new song called "Easy Peasy." Martin sounded great and his guitar work was beautiful on those jangly songs. It was amazing to hear the classics such as "I Love My Leather Jacket," "Pink Frost," "The Male Monster From The Id" and "Heavenly Pop Hit," which closed the evening and had everyone singing along. I'm so glad I got the chance to see The Chills play again and hear these new songs live for the first time.

Here's the animated clip for "When The Poor Can Reach The Moon"