Penetration gig, Engine Room, Brighton 18 September 2009

The Fireworks Factory is on fire, we're used to following the light

I approached the Slow Club gig at the Joiners Arms, Southampton a little cautiously. It was clearly being built up as twee/folk event which for someone usually found in the grip of shouty aggresive musicians is not quite my scene. But I do like Slow Club; they seem to represent a genuine avant garde in musical, lyrical and performance terms and this despite remaining thoroughly engaging, and normal, and witty, and of the people.....so anyway over to Southampton. All my trepidations came rushing forward as I entered the venue and caught the end of a very fey folk band, the Wise Children, playing very fey folksy music and engaging the audience with the terrible, terrible banter favoured by folk bands whose guitarist takes half an hour onstage to retune his guitar. Next up were two fragile looking young girls from Sweden, First Aid Kit, between them they play a guitar, keyboards and multi-stringed scandinavian wash-board and they do this exceptionally well. What was astounding however was the power and clarity of their voices which simply rent the room apart. Their songs make a good sparring partner for Slow Club as they seem rooted in an offbeat sense of the everyday and often quite disconcerting; breakups and breakdowns knowingly observed by children seemed to be an enduring theme. They're touring the UK now and worth tracking down. They've got a mini-album Drunken Trees out on Wichita which only costs a fiver.



Slow Club began their set by simply wandering into the room and singing Wild Blue Milk, a great song, in the middle of the audience. Like many of their songs there's stuff about loss and dependency, its funny and intelligent and uses a multitude of surreal touches up against the everyday, and, when it touches on love which they do often its never mawkish. They finish on another great (lost? losing?) love song Christmas TV again embedded amongst the audience rather than up on the stage. In between what comes across is their ability to connect with the daily yearnings and pleasures of life. To be honest i was thoroughly bowled over.

So maybe less about twee world domination, which will happen but not at the hands of Slow Club, who are very decent folk and it comes across.

You Keep The Beats

Plug are a great two piece from London town. Its always lazy to make comparisons to other bands and particularly comparisons to bands like the Gang of Four or Delta 5 because time passes and when they get remembered all over again it starts to feel a wee bit generic and suddenly everybody and their three-legged poodle apparently are the new GO4....but anyway I do remember the sheer visceral thrill of hearing Delta 5 for the first time listening to John Peel playing Mind Your Own Business and then about a week later seeing them live at the Clarendon Hotel playing to about 14 people and just being thoroughly entranced. And hearing You Keep the Beats it all came flooding back to me; stripped down and minimal bass, keyboards, drums; very relaxed and very funny and also very danceable. Take them into your hearts and your living room.

The live photo is from an odd night out at the Cowley Club in Brighton. Plug were sandwiched between 4 hardcore punk bands which in principle seemed doomed but worked well in practice.

A Year With No Head

I spent a year with no head, not a care in the world.
My feet did the walking. My hands did the talking.
I must have had some spark in my eye, must have had some smile on my face.
I loved everybody and their family.
I was a credit to the force.
I spent a year with no head, I felt fine.

I woke up one day, threw my name in the bin,
drank a toast to power, the power of love.
Ate the fruit of surrender, surrender to no one.
I must have looked pretty stupid.
I felt fine.

The Blue Orchids, 1982.
(Available from here: http://home.planet.nl/~frankbri/ltm2367.html)

Just to be quite clear about the nomenclature it belongs to The Blue Orchids. A very intense group who made me crack a great grin of joy whenever they played. For a brief time they were Nico's backing band. When asked what had become of them Nico replied 'I don't know, they are a vairrrrry laaazzzzzeeeeee band'. A Year With No Head will pay its respects to the twin qualities of laziness and intensity.