concert review

The life of a professional freelance writer is beset with the virtue of noble poverty. While waiting for my million-pound book deal to materialise, the world of writing hasn’t exactly left me short of bar jobs. And so this Sunday saw me back behind my old bar, serving up drinks and sass in nearly equal measure. Blessed was I, for this was no ordinary night. The main band promoter associated with the bar was retiring, and this was his swansong. A dozen local bands and DJs had turned up to play, and I was to catch the culmination of the event.

Pushboxer were playing as I adjusted my towel and poured my first pint of the evening. You know how some vocalists can produce a sound so discordant, yet it somehow manages to harmonise with the band? This one couldn’t. Given their MySpace offerings, maybe he was just having an off day. The rest of the band were producing fairly generic indie-pop-janglyness, but it was catchy enough to keep the kids happy.

Next up were Jack Green and the Band of Thieves. Now, it’s not a big stage. Come to think of it, it’s not a big bar. So, with half the stage area already filled by a drum kit, getting a string section up there is bound to turn heads. Adorned with tweed and flat caps, the sextet kicked off with enthusiasm and great energy, opening a new dimension, too rock to be skiffle, too folk to be indie-pop. My favourite was their second tune, “Full English” – a slice of silliness supplemented by a slight squeeze of ska. The band glided h, Teappily between the style of ‘gypsy-folk-punk’ made popular by Gogol Bordello and a jumpy-ska-pop-indie sound. The most inventive stuff I heard all night. Go check them out.

The crowd swelled as the next band took to the stage. Regular readers will know of my past life standing behind this very bar and my despair over the bands I endured. The Natives were one such band. A couple of years ago, one of their demos got regular airtime on XFM and they had some modicum of local success. Gigs at top London venues followed. Fame and fortune were beckoning, when, according to sources close to the band, the reputation of the boys’ tendency for drunken, narcotic-fuelled rampages eventually had them blacklisted from all the best venues.

Having added a keyboard player to their line-up since the last time I had seen them, they remain hugely popular in our suburb. Their new tunes, such as “Satellites,” seem to have abandoned their quest to achieve an identical sound to (other-local-heroes-of-2006) The Heights (which is a bit of a shame, as The Heights were really good), but show no sign of any new growth or musical maturity from the band, which is disappointing.

The Mod:elz were up next. Local boys again. Inoffensively bland indie-rock. Nothing wrong with the music, they were very good at doing what they did. Just what they were doing sounded identical to all the other indie bands I’ve heard in the last five years. Nice guys, good enough to lend their equipment to the other bands, just offering nothing particularly original. A welcome relief after the tuneless noise of The Natives – and, if you’re an indie fan, these guys will undoubtedly float your boat. I hope these lads do well, but I think they’ll have to develop character (like a wine maturing or a cheese going smelly) before London will really take notice.

Bombay Bicycle Club were a treat to see perform live. While their sound was also highly derivative, this foursome are talented musicians. Having won the ‘Road to V’ battle of the bands competition, aged just 16, in 2006 – and playing the Reading and Leeds festivals for the second time this summer – I had quite some expectations, and I wasn’t disappointed.

Jack Steadman’s lead vocal echoed a trembling vibrato almost throughout, and I’m still unsure if his end goal is a sustained falsetto like those of Thom Yorke or Jeff Buckley. His voice may still have some maturing to do, but it appears his approach to his music does not.

The Bombay Bicyclists aren’t afraid to mix things up a bit either – I’m sure I saw the guitarist and bassist exchange instruments for the second song. The third track in their set was the new single, released on 4th August, entitled “Evening/Morning.” A kicking intro was let down by a rare vocal misfire, which soured the affair a little, but a superb bass riff kept the show on the road.

“What If?” signified the band’s descent into the same riff-indie that I’d been hearing all night, but there was, at least, a pleasing diversion in the bridge section.

These guys are just eighteen, and their record label has been keeping them out of the limelight while they concentrated on their schooling. But exams are over, and the UK tour has begun. The versatility of these young men will need to be matched with Olympian stamina if this band is to endure, and I do hope they do. Big things ahead, I’m sure of it.

The night was closed by Kate Nash, whose performance had been kept secret until the day of. Kate had her first ever gig in this very bar, playing warmup for my very favourite local band, NINA (and The Natives, coincidentally), and has since found international recognition, with her debut album, Made of Bricks reaching #1 in the UK charts for much of last summer. She has even performed at the Coachella festival.

All this has given her the confidence to perform to her home crowd in a way that may alienate anyone not already a fan. I wasn’t already a fan. As she was getting warmed up, she let rip with obscurely screamed yodels in the second song. While this could be explained and possibly dismissed as artistic enthusiasm, getting right into the moment, Kate Nash is no Yoko Ono and shouldn’t issue yodel screams. It was a bit on the painful side.

While playing her first hit, “Caroline’s a Victim,” she caterwauled through her vocals and mauled and mangled her electric piano. What can I say? Her fans lapped it up. But I couldn’t help being surprised by the thought, as Kate unveiled a new song – a rip-off of “Do-Wah-Diddy Diddy” – that here was a young woman who had taken the music industry by storm and who now toured the world as a professional musician!

Maybe she was having an off night. Maybe she’d enjoyed the Red Stripe we’d got in for the bands’ riders a little too much. Maybe she just got carried away. Maybe I’m just an old fart… While I may think she overplays a chavvy accent to make her sound ‘more street, like, you know, innit’, maybe I’m just bitter and jealous. But her tone, her interaction and her performance all combine to suggest a lack of musical eloquence or melodic beauty that have been found by other local bands, such as NINA, despite their lack of commercial success.

I don’t want to end on a downer here, so I just want to say that I don’t mean to be overly harsh on Kate Nash. She’s a lovely girl. Her backing band are simply a superb bunch of musicians, and I really do wish her all the further future successes I’m sure she will have!

At 2am, I finally closed the bar and started kicking people out. At 3:30am, I’d nearly finished cleaning up. I eventually settled down on a stool and grabbed myself a beer as the sun was starting to come up. Six bands in one night. And I got paid. And somebody bought me this beer.

Life could be worse!

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Bands to look up:
Jack Green and the Band of Thieves
Bombay Bicycle Club
NINA

…and don’t bother with Kate Nash – she’s mainstream enough already! Check out

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