Eyes for reading. Ears for listening. Brain for going "uh huh. It's good". Nods thoughtfully- read this then go see Eliza on tour.
Monday 28 March 2016
Monday 9 November 2015
Catfish and the Bottlemen, and The London Souls, O2 Academy Birmingham – 8 November 2015
As predicted when I reviewed Catfish in the spring, the band’s autumn tour venue has moved to the larger O2 Academy with a capacity of just over 3000, from the 1500 capacity of the Institute in March. File under, stating the bleeding obvious.
Support tonight is The London Souls (from New York), whose album I have been listening to this week and will review separately, but wanted to see how different they are live first, because the videos on the internet show them in a better light than the album suggests. The difference is immense, whereas the recorded London Souls is considered and a little calm and collected, their live presence is wild and raw. The band is made up of just a drummer and a guitar player both of whom sing lead and back up. The drummer (Chris St. Hilaire) is a mixture of polite Ringo and uncontrollable Moon; one moment he is swaying his head lightly, the next he is a blur of arms and massive shaking curly locks. Likewise guitarist Tash Neal unleashes his fiercely distorted Gibson 330 on the young audience who maybe are blissfully unaware of the melting pot of influences mixed up in the band’s sound: think of Hendrix, Kravitz, Beatles and Led Zep. There is a direct link to early Black Keys but with more rock n roll than the Keys’ blues roots. This had bothered me initially, but within the first songs it is clear the Souls are more song based whereas the Keys generally work around massive guitar riffs. Somehow the songs work better with just the two piece, as the two musician’s performances work hand in hand, beautifully complimenting each other, filling in the gaps left in the arrangements with incredible technique, stunning drum rolls, impossible guitar runs. The album adds to the simple guitar drums on show here, but the live performance adds massive dynamics and a tonne of energy missing on the record. The songs are still great, but as with many bands they need to be fully enjoyed live and loud. The only problem the band had tonight, despite playing to a full house, is that almost everyone in front of them only wanted Van and his band of Bottlemen. I am sure the London Souls are being appreciated, but with just polite applause after each blistering track, it seems like the duo are losing an uphill battle. I think they must have been fully ware of this, as the latter part of the set, they don’t really stop playing and each song rolls into the next with either a whirl of feedback, or a beautifully considered drum solo. For me, I grew to love this band, from just merely liking them before.
My only reservation about this Catfish tour, is that it might be no different from the one at the beginning of the year. In between these tours, the band has promoted the songs off the debut album night after night across the US, the far East and Australia, the summer festivals, the US again and now back in the UK on a sold out tour. Van had mentioned in early 2015 about the songs he is writing for the second album being better than The Balcony, and you get the feeling the band has been given no time to work on this and just been told to keep flogging the tour while they are hot. It is true that the debut album songs are great, and many here in the sold out venue will have missed the smaller tour shows, so they will never have heard the songs live like this, but for the rest of us, we want to hear something new. As you will see, there is a taste of the future, and the rest of the show just makes up for any doubt in my mind.
The set is practically the same as the March show but the songs are transformed. Somehow they sound bigger and better, more mature, yet still the sound of young men smashing out songs they love to an audience who love the songs. The band seem to be tighter. Van seems even more confident, but amazingly with still not a hint of arrogance or entitlement, he still believes he has fought every inch and worked his balls off to get to this point: and he has, this is no manufactured band, they may be on Island Records now, but it has been a long journey only made to look easy by how young the band were when they started. Van’s voice belts out across the venue throughout the set, for the most part battling for space with the sound of the audience screaming back his words at the same volume. There were moments at the Institute gig where the pace flagged a little, but here, even though they take their time between songs and are more at ease, every song is a well-defined coherent blast - you would think that a band playing the same songs for months on end would seem jaded, but if anything they have found a new energy. There are moments when you feel like you are listening to these songs for the first time again, and that sick feeling of excitement builds as you realise these are the best rock songs that have been written in decades. It helps that the atmosphere in the rammed Academy is buzzing like overhead pylons in a thunderstorm. The crowd do not let up for a minute: it’s rare when an audience knows every word from every song and wants to cry it out: wants to? Cannot fucking help it. During the acoustic ‘Hourglass’ it really is a duet between Van and the audience and he is clearly loving it, pulling back from the microphone every few words to fully appreciate the chorus of voices bouncing back at him. It is not like when a singer points the mike at his fans and lets them sing the chorus, Van has no say in the matter, the wall of voices encloses him and the band.
The only time the crowd is quiet, is when a new song is unveiled after ‘Hourglass’. It is done so without introduction, or pomp and ceremony - and it does lose much of the audience who are desperate to sing along to something they know. For me, it is the absolute highlight - not only is it a new song (I believe it is called ‘7’), it is everything I wanted for the band - because it is brilliant. It shows Van has matured as a songwriter, but still maintains his ear for a hook and a chorus that his fans will eventually sing along with. Tonight, they don’t. It is funny though, as Van predicted this in the interview mentioned earlier in which he says that he will not introduce new songs in a tour, as they always die on their feet. He is dead right, but it is absolutely the correct thing to do… to give a glimpse into the next phase, and it is going to be outstanding.
The night closes with ‘Cocoon’ and then ‘Tyrants’, and the crowd’s voice returns as one. As with an intelligently extended ‘Business’ earlier in the set, ‘Tyrants’ is given a similar treatment with its breaks and slowed down sections fully utilised to draw in the enraptured crowd. It sends shivers down my back and reminds me of the way the Stone Roses use the false endings in ‘I Am the Resurrection’ to inspire and excite their audiences: but where Brown was only singing about himself, ‘Tyrants’ is deffo the song of the people. Although the lyrics state: “I won't feel the same in the morning”, I absolutely do, and I know the rest of the gathered faithful here in the Academy will still be loving this band for a long time to come, never mind just the next day. I cannot fucking wait for the next album, and am hopeful I am allowed to review the next tour to see how they have grown up again.
At the end of the night, as humble as ever Van McCann thanks the audience for selling out the Academy and says with an uncomplicated and natural honesty: “It has been an absolute pleasure… an absolute pleasure.” The feeling is totally mutual. This is without doubt the most exciting band on the planet right now. If you haven’t yet been hooked, it is only a matter of time.
Setlist:
Rango
Pacifier
Fallout
Sidewinder
26
Business
Kathleen
Homesick
Hourglass
7
Cocoon
Tyrants
Wednesday 13 May 2015
Thursday 30 April 2015
Wednesday 15 April 2015
Tuesday 31 March 2015
Sunday 29 March 2015
Catfish and the Bottlemen – Institute Birmingham 28 March 2015
Catfish and the Bottlemen – Institute Birmingham 28 March 2015
I have not looked forward to a gig as much as this for twenty years (since Radiohead in 1994 at the Wulfrun Hall). Catfish leadsinger Van McCann was still in nappies then, as is most of the audience at The Institute tonight, or not even born in a lot of cases. It makes me feel old, because I am, but it is also like a shot in the arm; knowing great music can still be created by new generations gives me a massive buzz, like a new lease of life. I have been playing the Catfish and the Bottlemen debut album ‘The Balcony’ over and over for what seems like an eternity and cannot wait to see how it translates into a live performance.
Fluttering arpeggios and Fleet Foxes harmonies matched with exceptional musicianship greet me as I enter a rammed Institute. It is the support band and after a few similar songs, they fall for the old trick of ending with a song that gets louder and louder. Hmmm. Good but no manly balls.
After a short break, due to an Institute curfew, four pairs of manly balls hit the stage, led by ultimate frontman Van McCann, whose confidence is palpably bursting. Catfish and the Bottlemen then launch into an hour long set that never lags. It is like a greyhound: any fat or excess weight has been worked out and worked off until all that is left is lean and mean. And despite the taste of success in the band's mouth, Van (as he is the only one of the four that says anything), is still humble in the face of such adoration. He is happy to now be playing the main Institute room having played the other smaller rooms in the venue over the last few years. I don't think somehow they will ever come back here - it is just too small for them now.
I cannot fault the performance - both musically and on a showmanship level. They power through the debut album 'The Balcony' like it is second nature but retain the passion that can sometimes be lost when a band has to play songs written and recorded 2 years ago over and over again. The audience are in full voice throughout and Van works them as his master plan unfolds - he has most likely dreamed of seeing crowds lapping up his hook laden choruses since before he was shaving. I have to say I am so fucking chuffed for him. In an earlier interview he has said honestly: “I'm a dead simple lad. I smoke fags and drink tea. I write my songs, I get in the van, I sing as good as I can. The people that get us are people working shit jobs or on the dole, like I was.” I do think his audience is changing, judging by the people I see around me and the sea of iPhone6’s - not too many people on JSA in here I would imagine, and not that many out of school either.
Van McCann and the band have faced some criticism from certain quarters for both emulating guitar music from a period when guitar music wasn’t that good (The ‘stupid’ Guardian with a 2 out of 5 stars review; NME boo as always; and The Skinny –‘indie dead’? No) and writing songs about being a teenager and enjoying getting drunk, smoking secretly and discovering sex (The Upcoming). The thing is, young bands should be writing songs about this stuff; it is life! And it is good because teenagers need to know others feel this way, and old men like me can happily remember what it feels like to be young again, just. The same journalists who badmouth Catfish and the Bottlemen for their immature outlook forget that rock n roll should always be about sex, drinking and dancing; otherwise you might as well listen to Yes, or Genesis, or Muse. For teenagers, it feels like the world revolves around them, and while that delusion continues, let them enjoy the ride, before the hum drum of real life kicks in.
Highlight of the set for me is a storming rendition of ‘Cocoon’ with 2000 plus voices screaming out, “Fuck it if they talk. Fuck it if they try and get to us” (as the crowd surfing begins tentatively - the venue says no, but Van says yes). “Cause I'd rather go blind, than let you down.” A beautiful sentiment, stated (as with a lot of Van’s lyrics), simply and straight from the gut. ‘Pacifier’ and ‘Fallout’ also lift the crowd after a strangely muted beginning for ‘Rango’. ‘Kathleen’ seems a little flatter than I thought it would be, but after blasting through ’26’ and ‘Business’, it is almost impossible to keep up the blistering pace. Van in particular does not stop moving throughout the set and his long locks bounce and fall, illuminated by a bank of the brightest fog lamps I have ever witnessed - I damaged my retinas looking at the partial eclipse last week and this is making them no better.
‘Hourglass’ brings the tempo and volumes down temporarily as it is a totally solo acoustic version (something Van is spectacular at on all the album songs - check out youtube for them). There are still those disrespectful idiots around, who believe this is the point of the show to talk loudly about stuff they are reading on Facebook, but in the main, the crowd are transfixed by the performance.
‘Tyrants’ closes the show and I guess is their one track that can be described as anthemic. Even on the album you feel the shift in style on this track and it translates better live. It is as if Catfish and the Bottlemen are maturing already into that tricky second album phase. I believe the sooner they get off this tour and leave behind the hype, the better it will be for them, and ultimately their audience. There are bands that are hyped and bands where the hype follows in their wake: Catfish fall into the second category. They have worked and worked, and with some named DJs offering their support (and now with Island Records to push them on) the Catfish name has grown, because when people actually hear what is on offer it is dirty and real and honest and without pretence. A rare find in today's music business: working class lads making a decent racket. They have the ambition and skill to end up as big as that other massive working class band from Manchester (and I understand Oasis have been an influence on the young Van), I only hope they don't end up regurgitating the same old songs like that band did - The Bottlemen are so much better than that.
So, London next and then the world. Next time they visit Birmingham it will undoubtably be in a big barn-like arena, I am so happy and lucky to have been able to witness them in so an intimate a venue as the Institute. Good luck lads.
Setlist:
Rango
Pacifier
Sidewinder
Fallout
26
Business
Kathleen
Homesick (extended outro by audience)
Hourglass (Van solo)
Cocoon
Tyrants
Friday 7 November 2014
Review: The Jam Setting Sons Anniversary release | GetToTheFront
Always preferred custard to Jam do-nuts, but this is good
Review: The Jam Setting Sons Anniversary release | GetToTheFront
Review: The Jam Setting Sons Anniversary release | GetToTheFront
Thursday 18 September 2014
Saturday 6 September 2014
Thursday 17 July 2014
Friday 13 June 2014
Friday 6 June 2014
Friday 30 May 2014
Review: Motown 7’s Box Set Volume 2 | GetToTheFront
I am not sure Universal owning almost every old record company ever is such a good thing. Do they really have control of all mainstream music past and present now?
Review: Motown 7’s Box Set Volume 2 | GetToTheFront
Review: Motown 7’s Box Set Volume 2 | GetToTheFront
Sunday 23 March 2014
A time worm hole in Dudley
Been up all night worrying about a rip in the fabric of time. Why is there a delay in this mirror? #dudleyblackhole
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