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.