Live Review | Current Joys @ The Sydney Opera House

Matt Wellham

After years of photographing and filming the London music scene, Matt’s now based in Sydney, Australia. A lover of the post-punk and alternative movement, he can usually be found in the grassroots venues, camera in one hand and a beer in the other.

Current Joys closed out Vivid Sydney’s first weekend with an evocative, deeply personal setlist that spanned the lo-fi artist’s previous eight records.

Vivid Sydney is back for 2026. A city-wide celebration of creativity, innovation and technology, with a stacked line-up of both paid and free gigs, the festival offered us our first opportunity to head to the iconic Sydney Opera House to see LA’s Current Joys.

Current Joys, the stage name of Nevada-born singer-songwriter Nick Rattigan, emerged from the lo-fi bedroom indie scene back in the early 2010s and has since produced a prolific run of eight full-length studio albums. With a discography as diverse as Rattigan’s, the Sydney locals were certainly in for a setlist of discovery.

The city buzzed with activity as the Sunday evening grew darker and the lights in the sky soared overhead. Each side of Circular Quay battled the other with beams of spotlights, putting on a beautiful display in the evening glow.

Approaching the Sydney Opera House, the sails glittered with the ‘Lighting of the Sails: Opera Mundi’ artwork by Yann Nguema. It was a visceral delight, with the flowing animations gliding effortlessly across the uniquely shaped canvas.

Once inside, the Joan Sutherland Theatre, a large yet cosy 1,500-capacity space, hummed as a crowd of all ages spilled in to find their seats. The lights dropped, a roar of applause rang out and it was straight into ‘Ghosts’, ‘Desire’ and ‘Legends’. While Current Joys may sound like a bedroom project on record, as a four-piece band they explode with punk brashness and energy. ‘Legends’ in particular ended with Rattigan screaming into the mic before throwing himself around the stage in his finest angsty Kurt Cobain impression. There was no breathing room, just pure energy and impulse, it was an absolute joy to watch.

Rattigan took a moment to say hello to the crowd and introduce the band. He was sharp with his humour as he bounced the calls of “DO A SHOEY” straight back at the audience, but underneath, he wore the vulnerability found in his music on his sleeve.

What followed was a set that touched upon almost every Current Joys era. ‘Symphonia IX’, ‘Fear’ and ‘Blondie’ all made an appearance, before ‘My Motorcycle’ claimed one of the best moments of the night. As Rattigan screamed the repetitive lyric “On My Motorcycle”, his voice breaking carefully with just the right amount of grit, a single fan in the middle of the seated audience stood up and howled every lyric back, throwing his arms in the air in triumph. From this point, every single song had the audience on their feet, swaying, singing and holding each other in unison, as Current Joys’ evocative lyrics found their home.

Current Joys’ single ‘Kids’, which has recently seen a second wind as a trending audio track on social media, had the entire crowd singing along, before Rattigan stripped back the instrumentation and closed the song with a delicate, strained solo performance beneath lights that glistened in gold and red. At the start of the show, Rattigan joked that he’d never played a seated venue, but as the band found their way to the end of the set, I couldn’t think of a more inviting, intimate space in which to experience these songs.

Stepping out of the Sydney Opera House and down the Monumental Steps, I left with a new appreciation for the depth of Current Joys’ music. What I once thought of as a simple lo-fi project had now proved to be a platform for an artist to stretch and explore his musical intuitions.