Headliners – Future of the Left, Polysics
Supports – Loads. See here for full run down.
Venue - Kings College, London, 4th Floor.
Time – 12:30-10:30 (both days)
Verdict – Best £20 I’ve ever spent.

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This is by no means a complete run down of both days, merely just a recollection of several of the bands I saw play over the weekend and my rubbish excuse for going home early on Sunday. Woe.

(Additional – due to my camera still being broken, the few pictures I managed to take turned out to be less than impressive. It seems that whilst the screen is broke, the ability to take a decent picture when you’re about 10cm away from someone is also reduced. I think about 2 pictures of This Town Needs Guns came out, which I may put up.)

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4 or 5 Magicians

Their on stage talk falls on deaf ears, i.e. no one really gives a shit, so thank god then for the music. 4 or 5 Magicians blast through a hectic version of American alt-rock with such gusto and eagerness, it’s hard not to warm to them and attempt to shout along to songs you’ve never heard. A set highlight was the feedback strewn ‘Ideal Man’ and the delightfully melodic Weezer-lite, ‘I’m In The Band.’ Excellent stuff.

And So I Watch You From A Far

Irish-instrumental 4 piece who replaced Fighting With Wire, and a worthy one at that. Obvious comparisons to Oxes aside, ASIWYFAF decimate all before them with their gigantic riffs, which are heavy on crushing barrages of sonic destruction without a hint of pretension. They’re joined by a bearded man named Ben for one track, who proceeds to splice jolts of spoken-word sound bites over the burrowing waves of glistening resonance.

Bearsuit

It must be twee-time because Bearsuit make an appearance, dressed in superhero capes and blitz through what feels like 20 songs packed full of screaming, handclaps, shrieking keyboards and more screaming. Thank fuck I like them – superb set, although the banter between the mouse-like guitarist and the rest of the band was slightly cringeworthy.

Cats in Paris

Probably one of the weirdest bands I’ve ever heard. A confusing, collision of manic keyboard loops, high-pitched Radiohead vocals and erratic drumming. It shouldn’t work, but strangely I found myself enjoying this carnival mash-up of bizarre sounds. Great t-shirts as well.

The Deirdres

The Deirdres swarmed the stage like piranhas around a doomed swimmer. It’s too early for twee and I’m left feeling confused and slightly bemused by the shambolic racket they create – which at times, breaks through my barrier of disgust. Plus points for having someone that looks like an even nerdier version of Gareth Keenan on the drums.

Gossamer Albatross

Despite the lack of older songs that I know, Lewis Gordon and his Gossamer Albatross posse put on a fine performance upstairs, even with only one half of the new rhythm section they’d acquired (“our bassist is stuck on a train.”) Their rich heartfelt pop-meets-folk-meets-The Mountain Goats sound is nothing short of brilliance – a band that deserves main stage status pronto.

Ice, Sea, Dead People

A discordant, scrappy, barrage of Liars-if-they-were-more-punk-rock sounds in about 20 minutes.  The guitarist spent half that time hitting the strings with his bare hands, rather than plucking them, whilst trading off quick-fire sound bites with his four-string counterpart. Like a faster, more pissed off version of Kill Kenada.

Instruments

Apparently you’re more likely to find rocking-horse shit than find this band on google. Of the five minutes I saw, Instruments were pretty damn good; taking the ever-popular math rock template and churning it with some nice pop-fragments, before turning everything up to 11 in hope of blowing a speaker/eardrum/someone’s head. Awesome.

Let Our Enemies Beware

Perhaps not the perfect hangover cure, but Let Our Enemies Beware are noisy as fuck. The triple-guitar attack of spiky, hate-fuelled post-punk is something that leaves me salivating for more.

Popular Workshop

I’m guessing the main stage has some sort of electrical current running though it, because Popular Workshop are all over the place. The bassist doesn’t stop moving; throwing himself everywhere (falling off at least twice – I’m surprised he had time to play his instrument.) The drummer continues to beat out a torrent of noise, whilst the guitarist chugs out waves of grungy-punk rock to an astonished looking audience. Amazing scenes.

The Retro Spankees

Ehhh….a musical version of a Colin Hunt-type, all wacky costumes, screeching synthesisers and no real tunes to speak of. Probably quite good for driving people insane but that’s about it.

Superman Revenge Squad

The sweatbox stage is the perfect place to experience the delicate strumming of the quick-fast spoken word/acoustic-pop of Superman Revenge Squad, whose delightfully amusing songs about angry dogs, Billy Corgan and not being able to talk to girls bring a smile to my face. My only chagrin is my failure to obtain one of his superb handmade CD-Rs. Next time.

This Town Needs Guns

Even though tappy-Kinsella 4 piece This Town Needs Guns look exhausted, their scattered, jangly pop still sounds warm and inviting. The guitar-work alone deserves a whole paragraph of praise, ranging from complex to ‘how-the-fuck-does-he-play-like-that?’ New tracks from their debut ‘Animals,’ slot into a familiar template of soft vocals, backed by mathy hooks a treat. If a band that’s suffering extreme fatigue can play a set as good as this, imagine what they’re like at full strength. This Town Needs Sleep more like!

Tropics

Actually incredible sounding – agitated, brash-sounding punk rock, that deviates into the post-punk scrawl of These Arms Are Snakes, whilst still retaining its own sense of originality. Watching the 3 guitar-wielding maniacs thrashing their instruments with delight and the drummer steadfastly beats out slick rhythms in an attempt to keep them all in check is one of the highlights of the festival.

Tubelord

First time seeing these guys, which is strange considering their touring schedule. They don’t disappoint; with yet another bassist quite content to contort and spasm his body in all manner of ways and still manage to play. The vocals range from a high-pitched Johnny Whitney yelp, to screaming indignation over waves of tight, stop-start punk. Definitely worth staying for.

Future of the Left (Headliners)

To round off the Saturday, Future of the Left play a terrific set, heavily weighted towards the side of making as much noise as possible, interjected with moderate doses of their cutting wit that always makes for a good show. They played nearly all of ‘Curses!‘ (No ‘Kept By Bees‘ – “that moment has gone” says Falco to one disgruntled punter) plus several new tracks and one that Kelso claims to not know how to play – “Andy asked me if I knew it and I said yes, but really I didn’t. I just made all that shit up!” before finishing with the 1-2 punch of the anthemic ‘adeadenemyalwayssmellsgood‘ and a 15 minute closer of adrenalin-fuelled, ferocious punk rock that had to be seen to be believed. Kelso spent the remaining set time pushing the crowd around like weebles, whilst Falco decided to make a tower out of Egglestone’s drumkit, which the stickman continued to play, right up to the point their dreadlocked roadie fireman-lifts him from the stool and carries him off the stage. One of the best things I’ve seen in a long, long time.

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To conclude – even though I missed Polysics due to my immense tiredness, the weekend was nothing short of a huge success – Smalltown America should be thrilled with what they’ve achieved; the promotion of so many up-and-coming bands, a chance to see some old favourites and of course, all proceeds going to nominated charities. A label that truly works hard and is the epitome of the DIY aspect of rock music. Here’s to next year!

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Links

Smalltown America

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By a very tired, but happy, Ross Macdonald.

Band – Dope Stars Inc.
Support – Richard Christ
Venue – Cyber underground layer of Electrowerkz
Price – £10
Beer – Cans or nothing!

It has almost been a year since I have been to Electrowerkz, which is far too long, as I still remember the energy that was buzzing through that small venue when cyberpunks Angelspit hit the stage.

Dressed up to the eyeballs we arrived to the thumping sound of Italian glam rocker Richard Christ. Eagerly going up the stairs I could not wait to see the electrified crowd and…. Well I was only half impressed. Everyone was looking fantastic, but were as stiff as planks in a desert. But of course everybody could be storing all their shape-throwing strength for the main event?

This unfortunately seemed to be putting a downer on the band, and it sounded like they were just slugging through to get to the end. To make matters worse the singer then abruptly walked off the stage leaving the rest of the band just standing there. I felt uncomfortable watching, so I would hate to feel what they were going through.

Then something happened: Mr Christ came back in a long red glamorous dress to kick the shit out of the static crowd with a cover of Blondie’s classic ‘Call Me’. This got a handful moving in the half-filled venue,  and this set the band into top gear to perform a extra head thumping version of ‘Fashion God’, for which guitarist Mark seemed to of plugged a high voltage cable into his rock socket. His head went into full headbanging rotations at a speed that most humans could only dream of… Very Impressive!

There was actually a little more of a hum from the crowd once they left the stage as they knew there was a certain band up next.

A few tracks on the deck and already the DJ was shouting ‘who wants Dope Stars INC?’. This of course got everybody’s attention even though the band were nowhere to be seen. The DJ tried to keep it up for about 15 minutes until everybody was replacing the word ‘YES’ with ‘You are a TWAT‘.

They did hit the stage, and injected the addictive ‘Infection 13′ into everybody’s eardrums. Seems that everybody had already had their jabs, as there was hardly a reaction from anyone.  However before the track had died down they mixed it into a early ace in the pack, ‘Bang your Head’. This actually cracked the crowds frosted front and everybody was jerking their heads to the beat.

Extra kudos to the masked man next to me, he actually looked the nuts and he seemed to be one of the only other members of the crowd that was loving it as much as myself.

One thing is for certain, front man Victor Love can give off a grand shout. As they charged into Saw 4 soundtrack highlight ‘Beatcrusher’  he ripped into the mic without any effort… Everybody ‘BEAT, BEAT, BEATCRUSHER‘. The backbeat thumped smoothly on, with the guitar tightly rounding off another Industrial hit.

When I thought they couldn’t sound any better the highlight came on in the form of Theta Titanium. The perfect mixture of chunky *chunk chunk* head thumping guitar sliced with trance style keys midway, and glowsticks were fired up by the best of the crowd.  As for Victor, he gave out some venue belting screams that put a satisfying grin onto everyone’s faces.

After a small break they came back to play some of their slower hits including the crowd favourite ‘Make a Star’. They then flicked back into upbeat mode for a cover of Motorhead’s ‘Ace of Spades’ which even though it sounded good, didn’t seem to make for a good polished finish.

However after 10 minutes passed and a large amount of the crowd had left, they came on again!

To the those that remained, they said that they would play any track on request. Somehow the requested track was ‘Bang Your Head’ again. This didn’t matter as the remaining people including myself were in full dancing mode, and I am sure it actually sounded better the second time around!

Other repeated tracks included Beatcrusher,  Vyverpunk and Fast & Beautiful. However I didn’t care as it really did sound good.

Photos:
Taken from thier myspace page as I was do busy dancing!

Links:
Richard Christ myspace
Dope Stars Inc mypsace

Band – Goldfinger
Support – Some complete pony of a band
Venue – Islington Academy (they have air conditioning!)
Price – £14
Beer – LOL

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I’ll be honest; I half expected to be the oldest one at this gig tonight, save for the band themselves. A ska punk show with a 10 o’clock curfew? Shouldn’t have to queue for the bar then! I couldn’t have been more wrong it seems. Much like myself and my two friends, a lot of 20+ year olds obviously wanted to see if 4 aging California skate-punks still had it.

You have to admire Goldfinger; for a band with all 4 members all well into their 40’s, they’re still playing ska-punk – a genre that is often regarded among indie music circles to be about as popular as a pig’s head at a synagogue. However, they can’t be faulted for the passion and vigour they have when thrashing out hit after hit, regardless of the genre they have been lumped with. One thing’s for sure; Goldfinger fucking rock and there’s no getting away from that. Before the James Bond loving quartet take to the stage, Keep It Fast has to endure the unmitigated shite of the one of the support bands.

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Obviously this band had taken notes from Fuckshovel who I’d recently endured as a support for the wonderful Jaguar Love several months ago. I should have got a medal for that, or at least reparations. I spent the entire set shouting “turn your guitar on” as all I could hear was the most horrendous distorted fuzz, coupled with some rather muggy drumming and some awful caterwauling from the lead singer. I don’t suppose I should blame it on the band though, it’s the soundman that should take the brunt of the abuse for being a tone-deaf moron. On what planet did he think this band sounded good with this set up? It was appauling. Islington Academy is, from what I gather, a ‘proper’ biggish venue, so you should at least expect the band to sound slightly coherent and not like they’re playing in a room full of crashmats, whilst smashing their drumkit apart with chainsaws. The one redeeming feature was the slow song they played near the end (mainly because the drummer wasn’t deafening everyone) but even that got tiresome as I weighted for the inevitable ‘he’s-building-up-to-the-noisy-heavy-bit’ which seemed like several thousand years before it hit home. Painful.

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Thank god for Goldfinger really. Either the soundman got over his retardo phase or they brought their own; as the levels for the rest of the night were pretty much spot on.

They come on to the always humorous fake phone call track that they used to end their first album and launch straight into ‘Spokesman’ from their vegan album, ‘Open Your Eyes.’ The response is nothing short of complete pandemonium, as the crowd rushes the barrier with such force, I’m temporarily stunned. I finally regain my composure as the opening drumbeats to ‘Counting The Days’ kick in and soon I’m pogo-ing up and down like a ADD kid wolfing down coffee flavoured ice-cream. From then on, it’s classic Goldfinger. They drag some kid up on stage to sing ‘Mable’, who fails to even sing coherently or loudly let alone remember the words and the song is cut halfway through and more people are pulled up on stage to sing/dance/hug various members of the band for the closing verses.

Throughout the set, they keep the banter relatively light, with frontman John Feldmann telling us about his wife recently gave birth (“and the good news, it’s mine!” He adds.) He also talks about the return of estranged guitarist Charlie Paulson (who looks more and more like a serial killer crossed with an evil henchman) and proceeds to slag off both Portsmouth and Oxford (previous tour destinations, so a staple bit of ribbing that happens whenever an American band tours.) Shaven-haired bassist Kelly Lemieux is strangely quiet, i.e. no jokes about wanking and Doritos. Drummer ‘Dangerous’ Darrin Pfeiffer once again gets his arse cheeks out and invites a member of the audience (some chump in a Reel Big Fish t-shirt) to eat a twinky from his crack. The ‘wall of death’ he then demands is somewhat lacklustre, but you can’t have everything. Also, Darrin loses points for not doing a X-Factor worthy version of ‘Thong Song’ or ‘Bootylicious’ – come on dude, if you’re still man enough to have food eaten from your anus, surely slamming down some rap grooves is a walk in the park?

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The swear-a-thon that is ‘Fuck Ted Nugent’ provides one of the most violent circle pits of the night and one I somewhat wimpishly step away from (hey, I’ve already lost 2 pairs of glasses due to excessive dancing, there’s no way I’m losing another pair that made me nearly cry when I was told how much they’d cost.) Even the one new track they played, (‘Get Up’) went down well, packed with upbeat ska-guitar and the odd horn flourish.

Other set highlights include the anthems ‘Here In Your Bedroom’ and Tony Hawk’s favourite, ‘Superman’ complete with saxophone and some of the most exuberant skanking of the night. The punk rock fury of ‘Miles Away’ cements Goldfinger’s reputation as one of the finest bands of their genre – big sing-along choruses, huge choppy riffs and chanting = bliss. The selection of covers they dip into for the encore, include ‘White Christmas’ (bizarre), Operation Ivy’s ‘Knowledge’ (odd school-ska), ‘Feels Like Making Love’ (utter chaos for those in the circle pit when the chorus kicks in) and biting version of their own track ‘I’m Down’ before launching into their trademark closer, ’99 Red Balloons’ – with German vocals and the chugging guitar-filled outro.

Goldfinger – have they still got it? On the strength of this performance; fuck yeah. Ska punk is still kicking folks, whether you like it or not. Would have liked some ‘Chris Cayton’ though.

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Links

Goldfinger Myspace
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By Ross Macdonald

As stated in a previous post, I was trying to think of somewhere I could send my dad for a live review and it just so happens the wonders of Peterborough beer festival had the answer. Featuring several of his favourite things – ground hops in a liquid format, pub games, ‘crumpet’ and Oliver Reed t-shirts (okay not that), why not let the master brewer review some of the bands? So off he went to sit on a stolen chair, in the middle of the entertainment marquee, with the back of the festival programme to scribble on and half of mild.

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Bands – King Kool, Plastic Soup
Venue – Peterborough Beer Festival
Cost – Fiver
Date – 23rd August
Beer – loads

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The rather crowded stage was set halfway down the long side of a very large marquee. The audience of about sixty people were aimlessly scattered on the large grassed area in front of the stage, with enough open space to park several full grown blue whales.

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King Kool

This was a duo made up of Dan Donovan and Joe Mason. The blurb in the program describes them as quote: “Kicking breed of art garage rock” – whatever that means. The singer was dressed in black reminiscent of Johnny Cash. Unfortunately, that was where the resemblance ended. I endured three songs as the vocalist seemed to be in competition with the drummer in a ‘who can be the loudest’ match. I could not determine any distinguishable words as Joe, the exuberant gum-chewing drummer, drowned them out. The singer to show his virtuosity played a harmonica and short solo on the guitar when the drummer took a breather. The patrons were offered CDs at £7 each. Amazingly none of the paying public rushed to buy a copy. To me, the overall sound was akin to being interned in a forty-gallon drum with several bricks and rolled downhill.

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Plastic Soup

Comprised of four exuberant performers, this group enthusiastically belted out three numbers with the volume and musicality of a jet engine. The lead vocalist wore trousers that appeared to be made from the skins of four Dalmatians. The first number seemed to be called ‘Plastic Soup’, with the singer who appeared to have watched a Mick Jagger video, attempting to copy some rocking moves. The rest of the numbers were a cacophony of sound that assaulted your ears harder than a bailiff banging on a door on rent day. They left much to the imagination as to what the lyrics were about, as the vocals blended into a wall of noise. The low frequency bass made your teeth vibrate enough to give white finger to your lips. (I don’t get this at all – Ross.)

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Links

King Kool
Plastic Soup

Peterborough Beer Festival

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Intro – Ross
Words – Mad Mac

Band – Arnocorps
Support – Thirteen Wolves, Dagobah
Venue – Dublin Castle (should be re-christened ‘The Dublin Living Room’ – it’s tiny)
Beer – niceessshhh
Cost – Tenner

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Considering I’d been waiting for this for a good 2 years, I wasn’t actually that excited until I got to the venue and attempted a mid-air handshake/arm wrestle with Holzfeuer (lead singer of Arnocorps) – fucking win. They must be the nicest band ever. I swear to god, they spent most of their rehearsal time talking to fans, shouting the words “GOOOOOOO!” getting photos taken, calling people “godamn heroes!” and drinking. Anyway…THE GIG:

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I caught the tail-end of Dagobah’s set, which was unfortunate as they sounded pretty good. A Skate-punk, thrashfest that I wouldn’t have minded hearing more of in the future. Unfortunately the next support band, Thirteen Wolves, I could have done without. It was a bit like watching that ‘band’ who cover all the songs on Guitar Hero. Except it wasn’t like Guitar Hero where you fuck-up the ‘Sweet Child Of Mine’ solo, turn the console off and play Gears of War instead – you carry on, trying vainly to keep in time before your fingers fall off and you end up planting the over-sized controller in the tv screen. I’ve never been so bored in my entire life at a gig (well, save for watching The Kits or this awful death metal band I had to endure at Esquires once. *Shudders*) It was a cock-rock horrorshow that I could have done without really – so bad in fact my friend tried to fit her fist in her mouth at the title of one of their tracks, which I think was some garbled nonsense about a wizard. Normally, comedy-Warhammer-lite shenanigans would be up my street, but really….no…..just no. Plus, they kept pronouncing Arnocorps wrong. (‘Arno-core’ for those uninitiated) There was a big cheer from the back of the room when they announced their last song – thank fuck. Possibly the worst band I’ve seen this year.

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As the opening bars to Little Richard’s ‘Long Tall Sally’ kicked in, a great cheer rose up from the audience, proving that 1950’s rock ‘n’ roll is still popular with the kids (considering it was featured in the opening scenes of sci-fi action horror Predator.) As the closing bars tell us to “have some fun tonight,” the band everyone has been waiting for troop on to the stage – Arnocorps are here.

Sadly, it’s a disappointing start. What should have been a glorious action adventure rock ‘n’ roll fest was hampered by the terrible attitude of some over-zealous fanboys who’d probably had one too many beerskis and had been watching tales of heroic action the previous night. Get the fuck off the stage you epic twunts and let the band play. Do you actually think I want to see you hurling your sweaty forms into the crowd, possibly braining me with your oversized feet as you thrash about like an epileptic on fire? No, I don’t. Suffice to say, ‘Predator’ was nearly ruined due to this, however it’s kept together by vocalist Holzfeuer’s display of crowd safety and terrific showmanship in keeping things in check. I probably sound like a miserable old bastard for saying this really. I know you should have fun at a show, but really there should be a line drawn between ‘having a laugh’ and ‘being a world-class cockend.’ I have to say though, the sight of everyone singing back the lines “what happened Dillon? You used to be someone, I could trust? TRUST!” was particularly heart-warming.

Some may say that Arnocorps are a slight one-trick pony. Sure, most of their songs follow along the similar pattern, but what they lack in variety they make up for in volume and on-stage banter, spliced with their film-heavy lyrics and reckless attitude. They plow through their most well known songs to start wit. ‘Terminator’ is greeted with rapturous applause; the steady drum and bass build up erupts into the well known chant of “Nice night, for a walk? Nothing, clean right?” Soon all decorum is lost as the Dublin Castle turns into a whirlwind frenzy of air-punches and Schwarzenegger quotes. ‘Commando’ goes down well with Holzfeuer asking the audience what they had for breakfast (the answer is always ‘Green Berets’.) ‘Collateral Damage’ is run through flawlessly and is possibly my favourite track of the whole evening – pure, adrenalin filled punk rock with a sooth-as-silk bassline and a terrific vocal chant at the end.

“Only sing this song if you believe it about yourself” Holzfeuer says. He shouldn’t be worried though, everyone in the room is hanging off his every word and the cry of “I’m Ballsy! I’m a stud! I don’t take shit from everyone!” is echoed back at the giant Florida/Austrian with gusto. “This is a goddamn, anthem of our generation” he bellows and there’s no disagreeing with him, or the band on that one. During ‘True Lies’ they pull several troops on to the stage to act as the ‘Arno-chorus’, an act that is later repeated during the ‘this song will never end’ saga of ‘Running Man’(everyone and I mean everyone, is encouraged to run on the spot), which had bassist Toten Adler crowd surfing on a guitar case – a prospect that was both amazing and slightly worrying at the same time, especially his near head-plant from the make-shift surfboard. Once again though, several chumps ruin certain moments by yelling incomprehensibly down the microphone, only to be ejected from the stage by the man-mountain of singer. At this point, the stage invasion is getting incredibly tiresome, but the band battle on with a rousing rendition of ‘End of Days’, possibly dedicated to all the choir boys and to all the goddamn heroes out there, ‘Last Action Hero’ delivers the upper-cut of uniting everyone in a frenzy of bonding, unity and brotherhood under the Arnocorps banner of valour and bravery.

Other set pieces, aside from chucking people off the stage include drummer Gellend Adler’s drum solo and wet t-shit competition (he’s undefeated, even again the rather striking young lady who took up the courage to challenge the power-house stickman.) They even manage to run through several new tracks (‘Kindergarten Cop’, ‘Red Heat’ and another about us Brits that I can’t remember the name of, but damn it was mighty fine.) The ending though, is disappointing. Instead of a thrilling version of ‘Total Recall’ they play ‘Eraser’ perhaps the weakest track on the album. Promising to “mix up their set” for the rest of their tour, Arnocorps exit, from what has been a night full of mixed emotions – some good, some bad but on the whole, ballsy to the max.

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Links

Arnocorps
Arno-Myspace
Anticulture

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Words – Ross Macdonald
Photos – Jason Kahl

Band – The Night Marchers, duhh!
Support – The Kits
Venue – 100 Club
Beer – ouch.
Verdict – Whhhoooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

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Ahh Speedo, is there nothing he can’t do? The man’s a tour-de-force of pure rock, there’s no denying that. His CV boasts the very cream of rock music, from his time in the mathy pioneers Drive Like Jehu, rock ‘n’ rollers Rocket From The Crypt, surf punks the Sultans and the barbed frenzy of Hot Snakes. Now he returns with The Night Marchers and boy are they something.

Before the main event, there’s the supports to get through. I’d arrived late at the venue, which I wasn’t to bothered about. However, what did tick me off was the only support band of the night decided they’d be late as well – thanks. Once The Kits finally started, I began to wish they hadn’t even bothered. I’d have much preferred to listen to the DJ spinning dad-era rock ‘n’ roll all night. Imagine the most un-offensive, watered down garage rock imaginable. Got that? Right, now add a hideously high bass tone and drown out all the guitars so only the piss-weak solos can be half heard, and add in vocals that sound like they’re being shouted at you in another room through a wasps nest. Yeah, I pretty much thought it sucked. Big time. Even Speedo seemed to agree with me: he left during the second track.

After some more ‘best of the 60’s volume 2‘ and several more pints of wallet-raping beer, The Night Marchers blasted their way on stage. Tommy Kitsos’s driving bass heralded the first song of the night in the form of the hip-shaking rock ‘n’ roll of ‘Bad Bloods.’ Just hearing Speedo’s “HUH!” as the song picked up was music to my ears. It’s a brilliant opening tune, with a terrific driving chorus and melody. Superb. From this outset, I already knew tonight was going to be a memorable musical treat. No disrespect to the other band members, but Speedo has the kind of stage presence that leaves you mesmorised. You’re drawn to his every word, laughing at his sarcastic and scathing humour, loving the quiff…if you were to look up the words ‘rock n’ roll’ in the dictionary, they’d be a picture of him giving you the thumbs up.

Faster than Speedy Gonzalez on Redbull, they launch into a raucous rendition of the first track from ‘See You In Magic’; the ever pleasing and chugging riffage of ‘Closed For Inventory.’ The Night Marchers might just well be the perfect band of Speedo’s that you can enjoy without being battered to death in a windmill of flailing limbs. Those of the glasses wearing nature like myself, had nothing to fear in terms of losing their precious eyes to a misplaced fist then to several misplaced feet as their only source of seeing power is ground into a fine powder. Despite this, everyone and I mean everyone was having the time of his or her lives. ‘In Dead Sleep’ ploughed it’s noisy furrow through everyone’s ears; it’s dark, menacing tones enveloping the 100 Club, whilst the joyous pop-rock gem of ‘I Wanna Deadbeat You’ brought on the first biggest sing-along of the evening (and perhaps my closest chance to hearing what a Rocket From The Crypt track would sound like live.)

The jaunty strut of ‘Who’s Lady R U?’ confirmed just how brilliant The Night Marchers are live. The gloriously riff-heavy bass work that slides into the hook-laden chorus is a joy to hear, as is a rousing rendition of the summery guitar-driven pop of ‘Jump In The Fire.’ At one point, Gar Wood started using his guitar as a ‘rifle’ to shoot members of the audience, wearing a smile that was so big it looked as if his head was about to fall off.

The highlight of the set though was the ridiculously brilliant 1-2 punch of ‘Scene Report‘ and ‘Fisting The Fanbase‘ two tracks that did not feature on ‘See You In Magic’ but should have. ‘Scene Report‘ throws itself around like as Tasmanian devil on fire; the energetic guitar work being put through its paces with real gusto – terrific slice of punk rock. Unfortunately my brain was knackered by beer and my only memory of the last track, was that it rocked. HARD. Possibly one of the best songs I’ve heard this year, seriously. With no encore (and rightly so, the only way they were going to top ‘Fisting The Fanbase’ was by playing it again, possibly faster) The Night Marchers left the stage like the sweaty gods they are.

My only regret is not seeing them on the other 2 London dates before, but then I’d have less money than Northern Rock and be visiting this website everyday. Goodbye.

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Links

The Night Marchers
Vagrant Records

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Words – Me
Pictures – Marc Jeeves

On Saturday I made the always fun trip to London and attended RoTa at Notting Hill Arts Centre. Despite it being a free gig, I still had to pay the £13.55 for the pleasure of visiting the big smoke, but still, it’s a day out and seems better than sitting on the Internet all day arguing about whether Peep Show has turned shit (it hasn’t) and trying to do Doom 2 speedruns (almost impossible.)

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The first band, An Emergency wasted no time in doing exactly what they said they were going to do at the beginning of their set: “play fast and loud.” An Emergency are a three piece, consisting of 2 guitarists and a drummer who proceeded to thrash out 30 odd minutes of danceable punk rock, interspersed with light comic banter in the form of a short debate about the merits of Marathon bars changing their name to Snickers. They seemed even more jagged and angular than when I last saw them; like 3 hedgehogs filled with starch wearing jumpers made of razor blades. Those looking for the missing link between Dischord’s Q and not U and San Diego’s Hot Snakes would do well to listen to An Emergency. Energetic, packed with boundless enthusiasm and quality punk rock that you don’t see much of nowadays.

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After that spirited performance, Jonquil took to the stage, a band I knew very little about. In comparison to the frantic mess of exuberance I’d just witnessed, this collection of musicians were a concise arrangement of different sounds and styles that complimented each other beautifully. At times their sound ranged from drunken sea shanties (see ‘Lions‘, a jaunty 2 minute romp) to wonderful melodic, layered pop music and of course, gang vocal chants which I love like a fat man loves cake.

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With the afternoon nearly over and much gassy,watered-down beer consumed, This Town Needs Guns took to the stage. It’s easy to see why this oxford quartet is so highly regarded in indie circles. Their tight, tappy emo rock falls into the similar vein as Kinsella types, American Football and Owls. With this type of guitar rock making a considerable dent in the music scene (see Pennines, Tubelord for further examples) This Town Needs Guns are currently ahead of the pack. Despite their dubiously long song titles (‘Want To Come Back To My Room And Listen To Some Belle & Sebastian?’ which prompted the light-hearted heckle of “you emo bastards!” much to the amusement of everyone, including the band.) they were an impressive and elaborate set of musicians, even though I felt both guitarists were trying to play different songs at varying speeds at one point. They ended with a blistering rendition of ’26 Is Dancier Than 4’ a fine performance and a solid end to a great afternoon of music.

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Links

An Emergency
Jonquil
This Town Needs Guns
Big Scary Monsters
Try Harder Records
Faux Disc

Band – Alec Empire
Location – Camden Dingwalls
Damage – £15

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Now that Alec Empire seems to have gone all ‘Vice magazine’ electronica on us, has he put his days (or ‘Nights of Violence’) behind him? Well, no not really. He’s still just as abrasive and caustic as before, albeit in a different format and style. Want to know more? Read on…

Obviously the success of “we’re a joke band, lol!” (Test Icicles) and the glowstick appreciation society (Klaxons) has had an effect on the first support band of tonight. Mixing standard indie-rock with a keyboard backing is hardly original at the moment – at least they didn’t have the same ‘um-tss um-tss’ drumbeats that seems to be associated with every-fucking-electronic/rock crossover band ever. Still, the drummer did well trying to hold his microphone, sing and play at the same time, whilst the 16 year old-looking guitarist and bassist spent most of their time with their backs to the audience, looking at the floor and generally making me feel incredibly irritated.

After some confusion (“OMG, ALEC EMPIRE IS ABOUT TO START!!!“) everyone that has working ears is left really fucking disappointed. Now – noise music is a tricky one to actually appreciate. Okay, I get certain amounts (Lightning Bolt, some Wolf Eyes, SunnO))) some other stuff) but really, bands that think they can peddle the kind of crap the second support act strained out, should be blasted into the sun. Four guys just standing about creating incredibly dull drone for about 30 minutes makes me want to walk into traffic. ‘You’re shit’ someone shouts during a quiet period – got it in one, sunshine.

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Anyone with preconceptions that Alec Empire has lost his edge should be taken outside and given a swift hiding with a keyboard. Okay, so he may not look/act like the noise terrorist he used to be. (According to reports of his Reading Festival performance in 2002, he was asked to cut his set short after nearly destroying the speaker system, but carried on regardless) – Instead, he has the air of a sophisticated and elegant frontman that smacks of both pretension and authority.

It takes a while for things to really kick off however; the new songs are warmly received “New Man’ in particular begins the first phases of a mass dance-off and many attempts not to crush the fearless photographers perched on the edge of the stage. other notable highlights from his new album include the punk-electro-lite ‘Down Satan Down’ and the sombre sounding ‘On Fire’. As the first notes of “The Ride‘ kick in, it’s like an electrical current has been passed through the floor. “Addicted to You‘ follows, heralding the biggest crowd sing-a-long of the night and a crush-potential of 9. Oh but it gets better. As “Kiss of Death’ bludgeons the eardrums, I’m exposed to what Digital Hardcore is all about. For the rest of the song, many others and I are used as human pinballs, bouncing from person to person in some nightmarish arcade, backed by the loudest electronic-thrash punk ever.

In some places, his withering German drawl is lost in the wave of dischordant sounds from Nic Endo’s keyboard and the razor-sharp guitar riffs, but this is made up by the blast-beat drumming and cavalier attitude that Mr Empire exhibits. Even though I don’t mind fake encores, perhaps the decision to leave and then come back on again just to play ‘1000 Eyes’ proved a big anti-climax. Anyone hoping for a rousing rendition of ‘Everything Starts With A Fuck‘ or the breakc0re-noise of ‘Gotta Get Out‘ was left dissapointed. Still, a strong performance from a musician who isn’t afraid to diversify his sound and still be incredible.

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Links

Alec Empire
Digital Hardcore
Myspace

Band – The Horrors
Support – Crystal Castles
Venue – London Astoria (or G-A-Y for short)
Cost of the beer – £3.50 for a bloody can!

“Most exciting band since the Sex Pistols“….. this is what was thrown at me at all directions when I heard that ghoulish pasty faced-harbingers, The Horrors were going to be performing as part of the NME shockwaves tour. How could I resist? As you may have read from my review of their last album, I thought that even though I wasn’t convinced about the hype they were getting, I still really wanted to see them preform.

After a sack full of delayed trains we sadly missed Mega-Drive electro lovers, Crystal Castles but all this was forgotten by the solid sweaty wall of people all holding their tight trousers and expensive beers in antici…………….pation for the ghoulish 5-piece to slide out from the expensive biscuit filled depths of their dressing room and blast us away.

The lights went off and the the air filled with screams of teenage girl which made The Horrors spring straight onto their instruments. I put one foot in front of the other ready for a grand night of dancing….. But instead there was a slow dribble of loud noise that hummed across the sold out night over a 5 minute period….

Ok maybe they are just “setting the atmosphere?”…

Another 5 minutes passed and still the fart-like noises were humming out, but now with Singer, Faris Badwan “Rotter’ shouting haphazard cries that I am guessing were part of a song.

Then just as I was thinking about how shite this night was going to be, they suddenly kick up the tempo with my favourite track from Strange House named count in fives. The crowd also woke from their hibernation and stamped, kicked and danced to the 3 minute hit. Then as I was in a mid-dance they shuffled back into a slow “improvised” noise session with a sloppy version of Draw Japan.

Like being in the Tate Modern looking at a white wall I felt that I should be understanding and enjoying this display, but they were smelling a little like tripe. Even the mass crowd had turned to stone again and fans around me were shouting about the nice weekend they had going to Whipsnade Zoo. Whipsnade Fucking Zoo?! Everyone should be busting moves until they collapse!

For a while I was amused by the circus themed keyboard player Rhys ‘Spider’ Webb spinning around on the spot like a hypnotized puppy, but after watching this for about 10 minutes while Faris stared at a large rubik cube I was ready to get my coat.

As predicted the last song was gloves but it seemed that everybody including myself was ready to leave….. Which is possibly why The Horrors suddenly left, lights came on and it was time to get my coat.

A lot of sad faces from the true fans (which all had amazing hair may I add) as they only played for 45 minutes and didn’t come back for more..

Band – Cutting Pink With Knives
Support – Ice Sea Dead People, The Smoking Hearts, Scream! Shout! Say Nothing
Venue – Club 85, Hitchin (old haunt)
Cost – £5

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A chance to see 4 bands for 5 quid in the day-glow tastic walls of Hitchin’s Club 85 was too good an opportunity to miss; so I headed on down for what proved to be both an exciting and disappointing night (more on that later).

The first band, Ice, Sea, Dead People (terrific name) were a pulsating wave of furiously noisy art-punk that fell into the same realms of catchiness as the common cold and Les Savy Fav. Incredibly tight in some places, but wildly out of control and abrasive in others, this Bedford trio deserve a much higher billing nest time they play. The intense barrage of ‘Hence Elvis‘ (the bands debut single) is a strong reminder that the spirit that Q and not U left is not dead yet. Erratically excellent.

If Ice, Sea, Dead People ripped holes in people’s ear-drums with their rhythmic slabs of condensed aural-battery, George Street’s The Smoking Hearts stamped all over the remains in steal-plated boots. Like receiving an unexpected fly kick, they blasted onto the stage and started pummelling their dirty punk rock into the audience’s ears. Vocalist “Rodd Lethal’ (ho, ho, ho) had obviously been to the Matt Caughthran school of “how to be an insanely brilliant frontman.’ His attitude, stage presence (or lack of, as most of the time he was dancing around the floor like an electrocution victim) was full of venomous fire; whilst the riffs chugged out like Winnebago Deal covering songs by The Bronx.

Hertfordshire’s Scream! Shout! Say Nothing were next, fusing earnest sounding post-hardcore with huge anvil-like choruses. Vocalist Ben Davies seemed to shift from a bile-spitting monster to a crooning heart-broken shell of a person at the drop of hat. His tendency to be everywhere at once was both charming and worrying i.e. rolling around on the floor amidst several enthusiastic dancers. I felt that in some places they were slightly lost to most of the audience, who seemed to prefer slamming into each other during the heavier parts and not doing much else during the really beautiful parts (which drew to mind the sound of a young Isis and even *Shels!) Overall, they should be pleased with their performance – it was passionate, incredibly tight and any band that sounds similar to Secondsmile gets my vote.

Cutting Pink With Knives have always been a favourite band of mine, particularly live, so naturally I was delirious with joy when they came on to the stage. For the short time they played, they didn’t disappoint. Splicing material from their two most recent long players, “Oh Wow!‘ and the stupidly happy “Populuxxe‘ they were in fine form (despite faulty microphones at the beginning); vocalist Eddy spent most of his time running around the bemused crowd, whilst bassist Alex threw himself from stage to the floor like some kind of schizophrenic weeble. It’s blink and you’ll miss it, pop-grind – in 5 minutes, 5 songs have been played and they plough on and on, battering you into submission with programmed beats and intense screams of delight. It’s like a pack of kids in a sweet shop! “Coasts‘ is a particular highlight, as is the noise-riot of “Fuck You I’m The King of France’, whilst “I <3 Structuralists‘ and “My Head Is Full Of Teeth‘ sound simply gorgeous.

However, due to the incredibly stupid and intimidating behaviour of one particular drunken patron (who it also appears was responsible for several other incidents during the gig), Cutting Pink With Knives were forced (for their own safety) to cut their set short. It’s a great shame when the actions of one person can spoil such a brilliant evening for everyone else.

(Expect another review of CPWK when I go see them supporting the rather awesome Cadence Weapon in a few weeks, oh yeah!)

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Links

Cutting Pink With Knives
Scream! Shout! Say Nothing
The Smoking Hearts
Ice Sea Dead People

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Words + Pics – Ross Macdonald