Courtney Barnett delivered a boisterous, two-hour set to a sold-out crowd at Manchester's Aviva Studios, celebrating her fourth studio album Creature of Habit with a sprawling performance that touched on her entire career.
The Australian singer-songwriter released Creature of Habit in March and had previously played smaller shows, including a set at Band on the Wall for the BBC 6 Music Festival and a tiny club show in Hebden Bridge. Tonight, she brought the album to bigger stages, and the sheer size of the crowd—thousands strong—suggested her dry, witty lyrical style and way with melody are connecting with more people than ever before.
A Carefree Return to Form
The 2022 documentary Anonymous Club followed Barnett as she struggled with the toll of her own relative level of fame, worrying about how her lyrics would be perceived now that she had a baked-in audience. Tonight, she was the opposite, seemingly carefree, repeatedly telling the crowd that "I just wanna carry on playing."
Her simple backing band was a key part of the show; bassist Bones Sloane has played with her since 2013, and Stella Mozgawa, of Warpaint, brought punk verve as indie rock's greatest drummer. The set delved deep into Barnett's early work and included something for everybody: the breezy pop-rock of 'City Looks Pretty', the furious feminist proto-punk of 'I'm Not Your Mother, I'm Not Your Bitch', and the languid, softly anthemic 'Need a Little Time'.
Highlights and New Cuts
Perhaps the highlight was 'Depreston', on which she spun something gorgeous and life-affirming out of a diaristic account of house-hunting in the suburbs of her native Melbourne. Of the new cuts—she played all ten tracks from Creature of Habit—'Same' was perhaps the standout, a laid-back, freewheeling rocker that recalled Lotta Sea Lice, her 2017 collaborative album with Kurt Vile.
Several songs reminded the audience that, for all of her clever wordplay and droll depictions of everyday life, Barnett is also a magnificent guitarist. Her playing came to the fore on the louder songs, with breakdowns during 'History Eraser' and 'Pedestrian at Best' being cases in point, as well as the extended instrumental outro to set closer 'One Thing at a Time'.
After nearly two hours, she rounded out a richly-deserved encore with the similarly boisterous 'Nobody Really Cares If You Don't Go to the Party', a fitting way to finish a show that felt like a celebration in and of itself.
