The first thing you notice at the Tamarama show is that no one is filming it. Not even a kid on a cellphone. A couple of young folks are shooting stills, anticipating a party that never quite starts, but as the band casually shuffles through its songs at the Studio at Webster Hall on Monday night, you note how much better this would all look on television.
Still, even though there are no cameras, the room feels staged. Down in front you see a dozen or so faithful fans — young women, mostly college-age — though what they’re fans of is up for grabs. Tamarama is a pair of genetically blessed Australians, Nicolas Potts and Jay Lyon, models both. But Mr. Lyon — neat shag of hair, electric smile — has a double life as the romantic interest of Whitney Port, star of the MTV docusoap “The City.” That his band has fans outside his friend circle is likely attributable to that alone.
The models in attendance, and by extension the modelesque, do not stand in the front; they do enough of that in their daily life, you imagine. They do not dance. In the middle of the crowd and off to the side, they see and are seen. They send people to the bar to fetch them drinks.
You think that this room might be better as a tableau vivant, soundless, a visual representation of hierarchies of cool. But the music is playing, relatively loud given the benign nature of the songs, and it’s clear that’s just a pipe dream.
As a band Tamarama is barely the sum of its influences: generous helpings of surf rock, with slight dashes of Hawaii and the Caribbean. As heard on its recent debut EP, Wonderland City (Universal Motown), most Tamarama songs revolve around the beach and the girls you might meet there.
On “The City” earlier this season, Nevan, the villainous, louche prep, described this band, which was playing an upscale charity event, as “like, the Beach Boys.” Though you know he meant it ungenerously, it is actually too kind. Mr. Potts and Mr. Lyon are amiable enough but, trading off lead vocals, sing as if they don’t want to wake up someone in the next cabana.
