Concluding the first ever you.will.knovv Oceania tour, South Korean artists Miso, Rad Museum and Tabber saved the best for last, performing at the iconic Prince Bandroom in Melbourne on Tuesday the 25th of June 2024. Despite the tour being their debut visit to our shores, Melbourne patrons were warm and welcoming to the talented trio of labelmates.
For some, this was a long time coming as there was already talk of Tabber coming to Australia prior and yet, the reality was better than the dream. The you.will.knovv Melbourne concert, with its 2024 Oceania tour presented by Kohai Oceania, thoroughly impressed with an abundance of finesse and energy. The energy was surprising, considering that some dedicated fans had lined up as early as 6am to get the best spot at the show, front row.
Ladies first, Miso took to the Melbourne stage with good chill vibes. Shyly yet cheerfully addressing patrons, Miso shouted, “What’s up Melbourne?” and shared, “I feel so good to be here. Today’s the last show of the tour, so it’s going to be a special one.” Despite her slower beats, Miso had the audience grooving to her tunes with ease.
‘Alone’ had patrons transform from swaying to bouncing their heads up and down, while ‘Let It Go’ had Miso doing a slick hand gesture of flicking away the past that was easily mimicked as a hand dance for patrons. If you weren’t feeling energetic enough, ‘Emotions’ had the Melbourne audience animated and excited. Although, my favourite song of Miso’s set was hands down ‘Riches’. The song stood apart from the rest of her discography with its quick poetic lyrics and a just as fast rhythm.
Despite Miso’s music much slower compared to the rest of the concert line-up, fans were very vocal in their support for the female South Korean singer. Miso herself also never hesitated to get the crowd involved to shout “Hey!” along with her and even bounced around herself on the Melbourne stage.
Next up was Rad Museum. As the lights changed and the words “Rad” turned up on the big screen, so did the vibes in the room. Rad Museum too affectionately addressed the Melbourne audience with, “What’s up Melbourne!?” adding, “You guys know me? I’m so excited to be here tonight!” ‘WHPH (Work Hard Play Hard)’ turned the energy in the room up a notch. Rad Museum stunned patrons off the bat with his fast rapping skills and commanding stage presence. Despite wearing a shiny black jacket that looked like a raincoat and its hood mostly covering his head, Rad Museum had the Melbourne audience under his spell.
Phones shot up into the air when the opening notes of ‘Dancing In The Rain’ were played, with fans wanting to film every moment of the song to keep and savour forever. ‘Some Girl’ and ‘Call Me Back’ were crowd favourites that had everyone dancing and chanting along. However, my favourite of the night from Rad Museum’s set would be ‘U’ as during this number, the room was intimately lit with the South Korean musician appearing only as a glowing silhouette, all while his smooth vocals echoed throughout the Melbourne venue. It was haunting and unexpectedly beautiful.
By the time we reached the final song of Rad Museum’s set, ‘Off-Line’, everyone was in party mode. Sweetly bidding patrons farewell, Rad Museum disappeared as quickly as he came and the Melbourne venue was submitted into darkness for a brief moment. Then, filling the room with light, 6 white letters forming the name “TABBER” appeared on screen and were all it took to summon excited screams and cheers of delight throughout the Prince Bandroom.
If you thought the energy at the show was already great, Tabber maximised it tenfold when he entered the stage with ‘Healing Killing’. Tabber’s crazy impressive falsetto instantly and collectively had Melbourne fans in awe. Everyone was dancing to ‘shut the f**k up, that’s mine’ and when the mood changed with the song ‘Being’, we witnessed the beginning of fans showering Tabber with presents from tiny koalas to bouquets, and Tabber graciously accepting the gifts he was given, chuffed and simply happy to be performing here.
My favourite song of the night also happened to be the crowd favourite. The entire venue sung-along to ‘007’. The epic tune had the Melbourne crowd combining their voices with Tabber to sing an unrehearsed acapella intro to the hit before jumping into the infectious tune with music. By ‘Electric Animal’ the Melbourne audience were truly synched with the charming South Korean, vigorously throwing their hands into the air and waving them around as instructed. Tabber had the audience eating out of the palm of his hand (not literally). As much love as the Melbourne audience gave to Tabber, he was keenly giving it back to his fans, often walking down towards the audience which had the screams in the venue grow louder at every step.
Just as friendly as his labelmates, Tabber addressed the Melbourne crowd with, “How you doin’ Melbourne? It’s good to be here. It’s my first time coming here, actually! I like it!” His kind words were met with loud cheers and even some funnier declarations of love. One fan shouted, “I love you!” and with no hesitation, Tabber replied, “I love you too.” which had fans swooning.
If this wasn’t good enough, Melbourne patrons were lucky to listen to Tabber’s newest release ‘Chi-Ka’. During this song, Tabber was gifted a packet of toothbrushes which puzzled me until I heard the lyrics of the song mention the word ‘toothbrush’, to which I laughed and found extremely clever. Turns out, so did Tabber.
To top off the evening, for the encore Miso and Rad Museum performed the song ‘Fallin’ together, while Rad Museum and Tabber performed ‘ROCKSTAR’. Despite already having a brief meet and greet and photo with fans prior to the concert portion of the evening, the trio stayed after their encore for an extensive period of time to happily sign albums and enthusiastically take selfies with the respectful and sweet fans that stayed after the show was over.
Overall, the you.will.knovv 2024 Melbourne concert was a great time for all. The merchandise that was up for grabs with shirts, hoodies and even postcards were minimalistic yet stylish. VIP patrons received lanyards, early entry and photos with all three artists, and the Melbourne audience truly embraced these three trending South Korean talents that were accompanied by the equally skilled DJ, Harrison Hong.
With enough unique music styles and talents showcased on the Prince Bandroom stage by you.will.knovv‘s Miso, Rad Museum and Tabber to keep fans satisfied, one would hope that these three South Korean creatives thoroughly enjoyed being in Melbourne just as much as we loved having them here. Hopefully, they loved our musically inclined city enough to return with more music (maybe even with something original that the three of them can perform together) and possibly with additional labelmates in future.
The you.will.knovv 2024 Oceania Tour was proudly presented by Kohai Oceania and you.will.knovv. The tour began in Auckland, New Zealand at Studio The Venue on the 21st of June, followed by Sydney, Australia at Liberty Hall on the 23rd of June, and concluded on the 25th of June at the Prince Bandroom in Melbourne, Australia.
For more information, visit:
https://kohai.com/ywk
https://kohai.com/oce
https://www.instagram.com/kohai.oce
https://youwillknovv.com
https://www.instagram.com/you.will.knovv
https://www.instagram.com/o0omiso0o
https://www.instagram.com/radmuseum
https://www.instagram.com/honjowolf
Photography by Grant Alexander.
