Bonjah - The Corner Hotel

As I have previously and very loudly professed my love for this band in the stalking episode of this blog way back in 2009, I will not bore you with spouts of gushing adoration or the desire for musical love children yada yada yada. I will however say that Bonjah's live performances are very much like a good cheese or a nice bottle of red wine, in that they only get better with age. You would assume that this would be the case for all bands, what with practice and experience and perhaps even a tour budget, but this can often replace that all-or-nothing intensity they had when starting out and were still fighting to break into the industry. You have probably heard me go on and on how much I would have loved to have seen Tori Amos play back in 1992, before she had a tour bus and costumes and emotional stability; that's an example of what I'm talking about.


But back to Bonjah; I remember driving up to Bendigo with Ruby just to see them play at the Karova lounge, I remember dancing like a dirty hippy with two middle aged fans wearing Bonjah t shirts, and I remember smiling awkwardly and staring at my feet as Ruby got them to sign her CD. This time around they have two albums under their belt, and what I remember is how packed out the Corner Hotel was, how there were lots more hippies that could put our feeble dancing to shame, and I remember how loud and good the music sounded. But the thing I'll probably remember the clearest and for the longest, when I am sitting in my tiny flat with my cats drinking white wine and reliving my 'glory days', is that after the second encore, Bonjah, Daniel Lee Kendall and the Joe Kings, who we did not see but who looked like they would have been good purely on the basis of their hair styles, performed the most ridiculous cover of 'I Touch Myself' by the Dyvinyls I've ever seen. It was beyond hilarious, and reminded me of how live music is often the catalyst for spontaneous super-groups, and why I love it so.

Photos courtesy of this flickr
These are actually pictures of them busking on Bourke St, I couldn't find any pictures of them from the Corner, and have no blurry iphone photos or shaky videos with poor sound quality to share.