Archive for the ‘Gigs’ Category
Tuesday, October 27th, 2009
From the ashes of the phenomenally successful Beautiful South, itself formed from the Housemartins, comes the New Beautiful South, and they tour the UK this November.
After the original band broke up 2 years ago, famously citing “musical similarities”, a number of the band decided to reunite and resurrect the songs and the sounds of this Great British Pop institution by dipping into the Beautiful South songbook as well as writing new material. Find out the November dates from their official website.
Carrying on where they left off Dave Hemingway & Alison Wheeler (Vocals), Dave Stead (Drums), Damon Butcher (Keys), Tony Robinson and Gaz Birtles (Brass) are now joined by Phil Barton (guitar), Karl Brown (Percussion) and Steve Nutter (Bass).
The driving force behind the original band Paul Heaton continues to pursue his solo career.
Posted in Gigs, News, Tours | No Comments »
Friday, October 23rd, 2009
It seems very easy to be dismissive of The Proclaimers as so many people associate them purely with their big early hits of the 1980s. That’s a shame because if they gave them a chance they would find some great, beautiful and intelligent songs.
This is what The Proclaimers brought to a nearly-packed St. David’s Hall in Cardiff last Wednesday. After a great showing by their impressive support Miles Hunt & Erica Nockalls from The Wonder Stuff, the lads took to the stage and quickly set out their musical stall.
With a huge back catalogue it is really only the die-hard fans who could singalong with all songs but the well-known tracks really got the crowd going, from those 80s classics to their most recent tracks from albums “Life With You” and “Notes and Rhymes”.
If there was one word that I could use to describe the gig it is “joyful”. That’s the feeling that The Proclaimers brought to their audience and have done so for a good few decades already.
Posted in Gigs, Reviews | No Comments »
Sunday, October 4th, 2009
Thursday night at the Relentless Garage in Highbury and three bands on the bill. The venue is perfect for this kind of gig; wherever you stand you’ve got a pretty good view of the stage and the live sound is spot-on.
First band on are Zeroscape who appear to have invented the new genre of Canadian reggae metal. They hit the stage like a whirlwind and don’t ease up until the end of the set. An opening set when the audience are fanatical about the headliners can be incredibly difficult, but Zeroscape win them over by being incredibly energetic and incredibly good. Their version of the Bob Marley classic “Get Up, Stand Up” has to be heard to be believed. A great set which looks difficult to follow.
Second on the bill are Symphony Cult, who are a bit of a puzzle. Their intro music is too long and overblown, which isn’t a good omen for the set. Sound problems through the first 2 songs mean that the lead vocal is lost, which is a pity because Charlotte Lubbock has a fabulous voice. They don’t win the audience over in the same way as Zeroscape because they don’t adopt the same all-out approach to the gig. The band have been together for less than 2 years and may still be looking for the right direction; the band play very well and they have a charismatic and gifted singer but there’s definitely something missing.
Which brings us to INME, who are touring to promote their fourth album “Herald Moth”. (more…)
Posted in Gigs, Reviews | No Comments »
Thursday, April 16th, 2009
At a gig like this it’s easy to be sidetracked into watching the audience rather than the band. Firstly because you want to know what the audience is for a singer-songwriter whose first hit (“Doctor My Eyes” in America) was in 1972. Secondly, you want to know if any celebrities have turned up (I saw one of the cast of “The Green Wing”). The bulk of the audience was made up of the expected forty to fifty-five age group but with a surprisingly high proportion of teens and twenties who weren’t with their parents (I even saw some on the Central Line after the gig).
Jackson Browne’s latest tour, the first in the UK for many years with a band, is in support of his latest album “Time the Conqueror” which was released last year. It’s always a difficult proposition for an artist with nearly forty years of back catalogue to introduce new material in their live set, but the obvious way of doing this is to play for two and a half hours without a support act. The mid-set interval is almost a necessity for the majority of the audience (when the Eagles played Twickenham, the queue for the toilets was longer than the queue for the bar) but I’d love to know what the musicians do in those 20 minutes. (more…)
Posted in Gigs, Reviews | No Comments »
