Leeds Festival

As we park up the dulcet tones of Alan Donohoe of the Rakes can be heard somewhere in the distance. It's a long walk to the stages but when we arrive at the NME stage, we are quickly reinvigorated by a lively performance from Metric. Emily Haines struts her stuff, cutting a glittering figure, all blonde hair and blinding light being reflected back off her sparkly dress. I’ve been a so-so fan for a while, now I’ve just got down off the fence. Rather good.

We have to leave before the end of their set to catch some of Enter Shikari. So we battle our way down to the front of the main stage where the teens are assembling in readiness. They’re certainly popular with that generation but I still fail to see the attraction. Their experimentalism, to me, comes across as just too shambolic. They seem to write three quite good tunes but then they chuck them in a blender together, which then produces the final product. Henceforth you listen to them and think, this a good bit before it gets lost amidst something strange and not so satisfying. I also find the find the vocals of front man Roughton Reynolds a bit too much and I actually prefer it when the bass player takes over with his more subtle voice.

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We stay down the front for the Courteeners, who are much more my thing. ‘Cavorting’ tumbles forth and Liam Fray announces that the ‘Leeds Festival starts now.’ Perhaps a bit too sure of himself that one and perhaps feeling a little bit nesh as well, dressed as he is in a big overcoat. He’s also dishing out the advice ‘if your ex-girlfriend is here don't speak to her all weekend’, cue 'Please Don't'. A couple of new songs calm the crowd a little but it soon back to the crowd pleasers such as a storming 'Not Nineteen Forever'.

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I'm tempted to stay for Ian Brown, who I hear is very good live, but we need to circulate a bit. We catch the end of the set from Hockey on the Festival Republic stage, who impress us enough to consider checking them out again when they come to Nottingham next month. In between bands we slip across to the Alternative stage where there's an awful warm up comedian, who is filling in between acts. Thankfully he gives way to the slightly better Stuckey and Murray, who give us a rendition of their very alternate version of 'My Favourite Things'. They’re ok but we prefer to get back to the proper musicians and we return to the Festival Republic stage to catch some of Go:Audio. Whose synth driven pop sound isn’t too bad either.

Despite catching those two, I’ve not really caught half the fringe bands I would like to have seen but we have to head back to the main stage to catch Maximo Park. We've seen them several times so we could have skipped them but festivals seems to be the place that they often slip in a rendition of ‘Acrobat’ and we couldn’t let that happen and miss it.

Opener is ‘Graffiti’ as usual, ‘Apply Some Pressure’ comes mid-set and they even bring on a brass band for three of their songs. Paul Smith explaining that they’re ‘a quintessentially British band’ and that he thought the brass section would be the ‘sort of thing the people of Yorkshire would appreciate’. Although I’m sure he’ll be saying something similar in Reading.

We also learnt that ‘In Another World’ is about a night club on a boat in Newcastle and the inspiration for 'A Cloud Of Mystery' came whilst he was playing five-a-side football. Cheers for that insight Paul. Then near the end, yes we get ‘Acrobat’, with added brass section and it’s wonderful, practically worth the admission fee on its own.

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We loiter down the front when they finish to catch the Prodigy. I'm not at all sure about this. Although I have to admit they pulled the biggest and most fervent crowd of the day. They chuck in most of their big tracks early on which leaves me wondering what they've got left to entertain us with. Half an hour in, we get a big bored, over raved, crushed and a bit sick of them going all out for the award for the most prodigious use of the F-word at a festival. The much tattooed pair of Keith Flint and Maxim Reality kept asking 'Where the F we were?', as if their sat-nav’s were on the blink. So we took the hint and F-ed off back up the hill to see what was happening elsewhere.

The answer to what's on elsewhere, was not at lot really. We end up at the NME stage where I had hoped to catch the end of White Lies but we missed them and ended up watching Glasvegas for the umpteenth time. As I've whinged before, once a fave of mine, they are a band desperately in need of some new material, as for that matter are White Lies. Well Glasvegas didn't give us any but they were an entertaining fill in before I head back down to catch the Arctic Monkeys.

If the Courteeners confused the crowd with two new songs, the Arctic Monkeys well and truly trumped that with seven songs from their new album 'Humbug' and also threw in a cover of Nick Cave’s 'Red Right Hand' for good measure. I’m not sure being asked to headline a festival and then using that as a platform to promote your new record, rather than play old favourites is really going to make you that popular. Particularly when your new album is less than a week old and even your die hard fans are going to be struggling to know it off pat.

I wasn’t wrong, there were quite a few grumbles as not everyone appreciated all the new material or the new direction the band have taken and they lost a lot of the casual fans pretty early. The new direction included Alex Turner reinventing himself with his own dark look, all long hair, leather and shades. I think he was trying to come over all Johnny Ramone but to be honest Alex, it didn't work mate.

Of the new stuff, current single 'Crying Lightning' went down a storm and I felt totally out of place for not knowing the words. In fact I was quite impressed how many people did know the words to the new album tracks.

Overall I was actually impressed; it’s the first time I’ve seen them live and I’ll be looking forward to the UK tour and certainly getting ‘Humbug’. They recovered admirably from a technical hitch in the middle of 'Brianstorm' and it wasn’t as if it was all new material. As I left to catch some of the Gossip and they played 'Do Me A Favour', I reckoned that was six tracks from ‘Favourite Worst Nightmare’, then as I reached the top of the hill they were into 'Flourescent Adolescent' and apparently ‘505’ came as an encore so that’s eight plus around four from the first album, including a cracking 'Still Take You Home', so a good mix really in what was a long set.

The biggest reaction was predictably for 'When The Sun Goes Down', one Turner admitted they hadn't played for a while, they didn’t need to this time either as everyone sung it for them.

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The Gossip were running late and I had expected to only to see the last track or so but I actually see them come stage. You couldn't miss Beth Ditto of course but with her flourescent hair she seemed to be making sure. Unfortunately she then chose to hide in the ‘pit’ with the security guards for the duration of the first song causing anyone but the front row to watch her antics on the screens. Their set was far from being one of the highlights of the day, so we only stay for a few tracks before making an early start on the huge hike back to the car.

That Petrol Emotion, Rescue Rooms

Tonight, we're at the Rescue Rooms for a bit of a special occasion, the reunion tour of That Petrol Emotion. Guitarist Raymond Gorman posted on the band’s forum the question 'What if you announced a tour after 15 years and nobody came?' A good point. My partner and I are ticket numbers four and five, which I suppose is better than when it was originally announced but then cancelled last year, when we were numbers one and two. Not that we’re keen or anything. I know a couple of mates of ours who are going but it's a real possibility that there could be less than a dozen of us there. Where are the rest of the true believers when you need them? Problem is there weren't enough of us in the first place. The band were always lauded by the critics but never really sold many records. When they split up in 1994 I got the impression that it was more out of frustration than anything else.

Of course you should never go 'back', many do of course but things are never the same. Still, it's good to wallow in a bit of nostalgia, which is, I guess, why we are here. I couldn’t do anything else really having been there at their farewell gig at The Clapham Grand in 1994. As they say, been there, bought the t-shirt, wearing it tonight.

First though, a support band of a similar age. A Nottingham band called The Amber Herd, their slogan ‘tune in, turn on, herd up’ with yet another Craig Finn lookalike on vocals. Is there a factory churning these people out? They’re very good and put in a polished rather than a spectacular performance. It does seem to be the case that musicians get better as they get older even if they do lose a bit of edginess.

We miss the start of their set but the first track we hear reminds me of the Doors, the second of the Flaming Lips, well on a Velvet Underground day, the third I'm told sounds like James, I would add the caveat that it’s James after having lunch with the Jesus and Mary Chain. The rest of the set is a varied mix too... Neil Young, Pink Floyd... oh I don’t know.



They finish with a track called 'Stage Fright', their debut single. Not bad at all. Although perhaps they’re a bit on the old side to make it big but you never know.

Rather worryingly as they leave the stage the already only half full Rescue Rooms suddenly becomes even less populated. Well at least we can kill any rumours that the Petrol’s are just doing this reunion tour for the money. I hope everyone’s just popped out for a smoke and not gone home early. Thankfully as 9.30 approaches it starts to fill up again.

The band amble on stage with little fuss. As lead singer Steve Mack fiddles with his loop tape, I realise he probably looks less haggard now that he did at their prime. Loop tape sorted, they open up with two tracks off 1990’s Chemicrazy album, ‘Blue To Black’ easing us into the livelier ‘Gnaw Mark’. It seems the boys still know how to rock and Mack having lost none of his old enthusiasm is soon bounding around the stage.

The band originally formed in 1983 from the ashes of the Undertones. The O'Neill brothers, Sean and Damian joined up with fellow Irish men Ciaran McLaughlin and Raymond Gorman and then added an oddball American front man in the shape of Mack. Sean O'Neill left after their second album and the current bassist is Brendan Kelly who joined them in 1990.



Next up, real nostalgia and a cheer greets the opening to the early (ish) single 'It's a Good Thing'. Is it really 23 years since I sat in the Student Union bar wondering what that perfect pop song was as it was played on the jukebox?

This is following by their ‘big’ hit... 'Big Decision' reached a massive number 43 in the charts in 1987. Given how well 'Big Decision' goes down it's a surprise they don't plunder its album 'Babble' for more. 'Swamp' anyone? 'Spin Cycle'? or the epic 'Creeping From The Cross', perhaps they're just not into revisiting the political agenda of that album anymore.

Their debut 'Manic Pop Thrill' fairs a little better but only because the excellent 'Lifeblood' gets an airing.

Nothing comes from the ‘disco’ experiment that was 'End Of the Millennium Psychosis Blues', an album that probably alienated a few people, sadly not even ‘Under The Sky’, although I gather it’s been played elsewhere on this tour.

Their fifth and final album, also one of their best, ‘Fireproof’ only provides two in ‘Catch A Fire’, their final single and ‘Last Of the True Believers’. No ‘Detonate My Dreams’ despite it being on the set list at Mack’s feet.

The rest of the night, that’s the last five songs of the main set and both songs of the first encore, are pulled exclusively from Chemicrazy, making a disproportionate nine songs in total. So one can only assume that the band see this as their best piece of work. Others may say that there are three other candidates for that accolade. It is probably their most commercial but it still managed to undersell its three predecessors.

All in all it’s a terrific performance all round, particularly considering they’ve been apart for so long. O'Neill and Gorman combine well with their guitars and Mack shows that he can still sing those high notes, as well as dance and drink what appeared to be a tumbler of whisky at the same time.



The crowd are appreciative but not riotous. There’s a bit of light bopping down the front but nothing too strenuous, some of those waistlines won’t permit much more these days. The band remark on how well the crowd have aged. Are they sure about that?

They are cheered back for a second encore, which is, wait for it, ‘Chemicrazy’, an obscure b-side that although it bares the same name as the album didn’t make it on to the record. It’s probably not terribly well known and it’s very difficult to get hold of, I know I’ve tried. I got it eventually, last week.



The band look genuinely pleased with the overall reaction and Mack is quickly at the t-shirt stall afterwards, shaking everyone’s hand. If this is their second obituary then so be it but if so, we'll all be the worse for it.

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Joy Formidable, The Royal

As we walk in to the ‘Red Room’ of The Royal, the first thing I notice is how busy it is, which is a pleasant surprise. The second thing I notice is that the band currently on stage don’t appear to have a lead singer. Then I see him, right up on top of the speaker stack. That’s an old trick for sure but not often performed by a band third on the bill. These are 'The Souvenirs' the first of two local bands playing tonight. I immediately think Eddie Argos and Art Brut; it's the way singer Dale Dawson dresses, struts about and the art punk sound of the band.



We only catch the very end of their set, so it’s difficult to comment really but if the state of Mr Dawson is anything to go by, it must have been a good set. He looked totally wrecked.

Serenaded to the stage by Suede’s ‘Animal Nitrate’, Ryan Needham of ‘You Animals’ tells us that they were only given two days notice of this support slot and by the way he disses Derby, I get the impression they’ve hot footed it across Britain in a transit van to fill this slot but no. A quick look at their Myspace reveals they too are Derby boys, and like 'The Souvenirs', well established on the local scene.

They are an energetic five piece who struggle for space on the stage and have something of ‘The View’ about them or is that just because they’re a tad shambolic at times, in a good way. We’re not tally convinced about the point of the keyboard player though, the token girl seems oddly lost, as is her contribution. Her keyboards get lost somewhere amongst their riotous sound, which has potential and would become more intelligible, if they calmed down a touch.



The highlight of the night almost arrived when Ryan seemed to contemplate swinging on one of the Royal’s ‘posh’ chandeliers; it used to be a hotel you know. He seems to change his mind at the last moment, it’s a good job, it would not have held his weight and could have fused the whole building. He just gives it a shove instead, popping a bulb in the process.

They finish by pushing a speaker off the stage and hurling a guitar after it, everyone’s gone so 'rock n roll' tonight and it’s a good job the crowd are standing a little back. Ryan then plays the last few notes on the cymbals with his microphone. I hope they find fame and fortune soon because they’re going to be going through some equipment at some rate.

Ryan does appear to be a big Joy Formidable fan, having seen them last month at the Dot-to-Dot and seems thrilled they’ve got in to see them free tonight.

The Joy Formidable certainly aren’t local, hailing from Mold, North Wales. They sneak up onto the stage with little fuss but quickly set about living up to and then trampling all over their already impressive live reputation. They’ve improved since we last saw them, their sound becoming a bit more distinguishable, less of a haze but still sounding ethereal; think early Lush with balls and a touch of Kim Deal thrown in for good measure. The critics have tagged it ‘shoegazing’ as they did then and do so again now.

They open with their current single, the terrific ‘Whirring’ and immediately put everything into a thumping delivery of it. An approach they continue all night. In fact it leaves you exhausted just watching the amount of energy they expend, particularly Matt Thomas on drums. Such fantastic drumming and his pounding rhythms are the backbone of the power of the band. His efforts leave him visibly gasping for breath. Regrettably my camera battery gives out before I can get a photo of him and his under fire drum kit.

Suppose you could also feel sorry for my ears, his thundering delivery, along with Ritzy Bryan’s eardrum-shredding guitar makes my ears wonder why we elected to be front row.



‘Whirring’ ends or rather doesn’t and instead merges in to the thumping intro of ‘Cradle’. Possibly their two best songs back to back, a brilliant duo of urgent, thrusting pop.

The band clearly know how to write a catchy song even if they do choose to layer a haze of noise over it. They could of course go away, capitalise on that inherent catchiness, and write a classic pop song. I’m sure they’re well capable. They could bag a big hit and never look back, never play the likes of the ‘Red Room’ again, which would be shame of course, but judging by the new stuff played tonight ‘Greyhounds’, ‘Anemone’ and ‘Spectrum’ (I think), they have no intention of deviating from their current path. Good job too. ‘Spectrum’, if that is indeed what it is called, was a definite highlight for me.



Ritzy manages to juggle looking pretty cool in black stockings, boots etc, whilst playing guitar and managing not to trip over her huge pedal board, although sometimes only just, whilst all the time slaying us with her voice. She doesn’t talk much but perhaps she doesn’t have the breath to spare and instead seems to rely on her piercing eyes to communicate with the crowd.

Then there’s the great basslines laid down by Rhydian Dafydd. At times you need three sets of eyes to take it all in.

A thundering version of ‘The Last Drop’, think Breeders, is followed by the more mellow ‘Ostrich’ which ends with its solemn drum beats, giving Matt a rest of sorts.



Then it’s the ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs’ of ‘Austere’, which may or may not have something to do with the ‘Moaning’ part of the title of their oddly entitled mini-album ‘A Balloon Called Moaning’. The song does seem to hint at erotic intentions, although it’s often difficult to make much sense of Ritzy’s lyrics. One of their fans clearly got very excited about it and compiled a video for it using clips from the website Beautiful Agony, which was promptly banned by everyone, even YouTube. The band loved it though and still host it on thejoyformidable.com. It’s actually really good, rather ermm... arty, although probably NSFW.

They finish their nine song set with the anthem that is ‘The Greatest Light Is The Greatest Shade’. It’s a fitting finale; good enough to make the hairs on your neck stand up.

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Cradle.mp3

Cradle - The Joy Formidable

Anemone on YouTube

Maximo Park, Rock City

We’re at Rock City nice and early to catch the support bands but we’re still not there quite early enough to get a good enough spot for decent photos. Sorry.

Stricken City desperately want to be Florence & The Machine, which is no bad thing of course, they just need a bit more practice. They describe themselves as ‘mistakist’ and produce a slightly clumsy set with barely audible vocals by singer Rebekah Raa who also tinkles away on her Korg keyboard. That said, they do have a certain charm about them.



Raa slinks across the stage as the boys behind her dish out some decent tunes. She is a nice enough front person, attractive, dishevelled, an indie pin-up girl in the making, although she needs to acquire a more confident stage presence.

We were expecting stage presence in spades from Shingai Shoniwa of tonight’s advertised main support, the Noisettes, but the band have, to coin a Maximo Park phrase 'gone missing'. Illness in the band has prompted the Bombay Bicycle Club to step in as replacements for a few dates, which is to our good fortune. I'm not convinced about the reinvented Noisettes, who if their current hit is anything to go by have forsaken their noisy Siouxsie Sioux type sound for disco but I can’t comment because they’re not here.

The Bombay Bicycle Club on the other hand are here and are much more my thing. They are a very likeable indie band who started out when they were all just fifteen. Now at the grand old age of... well they must be pushing nineteen, they have a few EP’s and singles under their belt. They finally have an album due for release in July.



If Rebekah Raa was indie girl personified then Jack Steadman plays the indie boy role to a T. Although at first I think his band are better than he is. I was impressed by them, they could play but their excellent tunes were at first let down by his vocals but once he decided to look up from the floor a bit more often things seem to improve. They started out sounding a bit gloomy but their tunes got more upbeat and jangly as they went along. I might just get that album.

So to the Park and a touch of deja vu, as they open with 'Grafitti', just as they did two years ago. Then its sirens a whir, riffs a surge and Paul Smith, looking as dapper as ever, complete with the obligatory hat, with a megaphone in hand as he goes all Wayne Coyne in the middle of ‘Wraithlike’. God knows what he's singing at that point. Another new track, 'A Cloud Of Mystery' from their new album ‘Quicken The Heart’ follows, an album on which they further fine tune that winning Park formula.



When a band gets to the three album point you wonder what they're going to leave out and there are inevitable casualties in the set but it’s good to hear that 'I Want You To Stay', up next, is still there. To be fair to the band they’re not a band who traipse out the same set every night and whilst we may have missed out on some stuff played elsewhere on this tour nobody else has yet been treated to the excellent 'Your Urge' off 'Our Earthly Pleasures'. A welcome surprise.

Smith, as usual, leaps around the stage like a man possessed, pointing and gesturing at... well just about anyone and everything. He has his audience in the palm of his hand from the off. There’s something about his magnetic presence that pulls you in and demands you have as good as time as he is. So we do. The atmosphere at Rock City tonight is simply electric.

He’s relentlessly energetic, even during the slower songs. Lukas Wooller tries, at times, to match his energetic leader, tipping his keyboard up, down and sideways, playing it at various angles, particularly during a fast and furious ‘Now I'm All Over The Shop’. Perhaps he’s a frustrated guitarist. The rest of the band just leave them to it, preferring instead to simply dish out that Maximo sound to perfection.



One criticism of many gigs that I go to is that the vocals are not always as audible as they could be. Tonight, you can hear every word of Smith’s poetic lyrics and at no detriment to the power of the music. So full marks to the sound technicians.

'Books From Boxes' goes down a storm but 'Going Missing' was, of course, again, simply terrific with Smith perched on the front of the stage for most of it.

He then introduces what, according to him, is possibly their 'funkiest' song yet, that being ‘Lets Get Clinical’ but he then slaps an over-16 certificate on it before admittedly they’d know what he means anyway as he urges us to ‘wash ourselves in sin’.

My partner leans across to ask what the next great song is, as they play ‘Tanned’ from the new LP. Smith disappears briefly towards the end of it, perhaps for a brief lie down, and when he returns the band are already into ‘Calm’.

They seemed to lose momentum with those more thoughtful songs but then they have a good go at getting it back with 'Our Velocity', which lifts the pace back to breakneck. Smith once again looking so hyped up you are worried he might explode.

Then to huge delight down the front, Smith counts them in ‘One in a million, Two is a crowd...’, another old favourite ‘The Night I Lost My Head’.



'The Kids Are Sick Again' is an odd record and an even odder choice as a lead single and tonight they try to turn it into an anthem with the megaphone making another appearance but it never quite works out. Well not for me, unlike the closing 'Girls That Play Guitars' which clearly does work.

The encore begins with a new song, not even on the new album, ‘That Beating Heart’ and then it’s a slow build through ‘Questing, Not Coasting’ to the expected finale of 'Apply Some Pressure'.

Whether 'Apply Some Pressure' is a good one to finish with I'm not sure. Last time they played it mid-set and it brought the house down, this time it's the mid-set show stopper 'Going Missing' that I’ll go home with inside my head.

Maximo Park are an excellent band to see live and tonight they were on top form. All three of their albums but particularly the last two really take on a new life on stage. They could have done as a lot of bands who emerged at the same time have done and gone Arena on us but you get the impression Paul Smith and the band like it cosy like this. Full marks to them for that.

So almost as good as it gets, well, apart from, just as at their gig here two years, there’s still no 'Just, A Glimpse' on this tour but perhaps I’m just being picky.

‘We're Maximo Park and this is what we do’ so says Smith as they leave us and tells us how much he loves the Nottingham crowd, well don't leave it two years then next time mate. Awesome.

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Maximo Park - Let's Get Clinical.mp3

Maximo Park - Our Velocity.mp3

The Hours, Sheffield Leadmill

Things were a bit bleak in Sheffield in 1980. The steel industry was in steep decline and there wasn’t much future for the youth of Sheffield. Amongst this background, in a derelict flour mill in a rundown part of the city a mix of volunteers consisting of students, artists and the unemployed came together to set up a venue for people like themselves who had nowhere to go. The Leadmill was born.

Tonight, we are stood in that old flour mill sipping half pint bottles of Newcastle Brown and listening to London’s The Glasslights, who are very good. As seems to be the case with almost all support bands these days.

By the way, if you thought that pint bottles of Newcastle Brown were overpriced in clubs, wait until you get acquainted with these new measures. Frighteningly expensive. Anyhow back to the Glasslights. On first listen they appear to have some quality songs and I’m sure someone somewhere is touting them, along with all the other bands that are being touted, as the next big thing. It’ll be interesting to see what develops. The band release their first single this summer, entitled ‘Someone Like Me’ or as Andrew the lead singer kept telling us, you can get it now for £2 from one of their gigs.



So to local boy Anthony Genn, who together with pianist Martin Slattery are the nuclei of The Hours. Although the band have now been extended to a six piece live unit. Genn is a former member of Pulp but he gained notoriety when he streaked on stage with Elastica at Glastonbury in 1995. The band have just finished a support slot with Kasabian, now there’s an odd mix.



Genn makes for a confident and cocky front man who banters freely with the crowd, many of whom seem to know him personally. If you were not a Sheffield-ite or a football fan, you would have been well lost when the discussion turned to a certain Sheffield United striker who missed a sitter in the previous evening's play-off game.

They open with 'These Days' off the new album but the band are soon dipping into their ‘Narcissus Road’ album. ‘Narcissus Road’ was a hell of a good album and not just for its Damien Hirst artwork. The title track, third track up tonight, sounds particularly fantastic.

The new album also has artwork, as well as funding from Hirst. Can it be as good? Well, probably not. New numbers like ‘Come On’ are fairly predictable and inoffensive. Probably having too many soft-rock Coldplay or even Keane moments.

‘Car Crash’ is better. An ode to an ex-girlfriend, where Genn describes their relationship as a car crash and appears to regret starting it. He claims that he still thinks of her ‘sometimes but not that often’. Yeah right mate. You’ve been thinking about her so little you’ve written a song about it! Get over her, move on.



Slattery comes out from behind his keyboards to blow on one of those pocket organ type things for their new single ‘Big Black Hole’. A song about alcoholism. In fact there aren’t many uplifting songs in the Hours armoury; Genn seems to have had a somewhat colourful past.

So to ‘Ali In The Jungle’ which is simply brutal. Still one hell of a good record.

The place is almost jumping by now, although ‘Think Again’ slows the tone a little followed by ‘People Say’ which has been used in the opening scenes of Hollyoaks but we won’t use that against it. Then again what band hasn’t been featured in Hollyoaks.

By the time they close the set with ‘Murder Or Suicide’ there’s even dancing going on. Weird.



They encore with ‘Back When You Were Good’ and then close a near note-perfect set with last year’s single and title track of the new album ‘See The Light’.

For once it’s me, who doesn’t get their favourite played, no 'Love You More' tonight. Odd, considering it was a single.

Genn tells everyone to go home and spread the word, even if it’s only to the family pet. Well I’ll compromise. I’ll whisper it; if they got big we’d lose these intimate moments in the back room of that flour mill.

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Art Brut, Rescue Rooms

It's very quiet at the Rescue Rooms when I arrive and most of tonight’s two bands appear to be at the bar swelling the numbers. Eddie Argos is there in a Columbo style mac shaking a few hands but basically trying to keep his fan base bonding to a minimum. As some of his fans are scarier than even he is, he’s probably wise to keep his distance.

Support is from the peculiarly named Robocop Kraus and they look stereotypically German, so it’s a relief to find at that is where they hail from. Although they sing exclusively in English.

At times their music borders on eighties disco but at other times they sound like a decent post-punk indie band. Their well dressed lead singer thinks he looks and dances like Bryan Ferry. He hasn’t got the look right but yes the dancing is bad. At one point he's waving his arms around like he's trying to fly as they play a souped up version of what sounds like one of those bad euro disco numbers you hear in ski resorts. After a couple of songs he wades in to the audience. Is he trying to upstage Eddie, I’m sure that’s what he plans to do.



They’re a very accomplished outfit, not surprising since they’re certainly not youngsters and the band was formed in 1998. Musically they are actually pretty good and they go down well.

During their last song the lead singer takes the drum kit apart until just one drum is left and he carries that into the crowd with the drummer still attached to it. A rather unique finale.

Afterwards there’s a bit of a rush to the merchandising stall. This may be to buy their new CD or perhaps it because they’ve been pleading on their website for places to sleep and have urged anyone who could put them up for a night to come forward. They’ve even offered to do the vacuum cleaning and the dishes.

Half an hour later, Art Brut shuffle on stage and Eddie, looking more Stephen Fry than rock n roll, opens with the words 'Slept on my face, and woke up confused'. Yep it’s one of their many songs about drinking. New single ‘Alcoholics Unanimous’ tumbles forth with Argos trying to remember the night before and sending out apologetic text messages to everyone just in case.



Suddenly it’s all gone a bit mental, I’m not sure where the crowd have come from but they’re here now, and when ‘My Little Brother’ follows, the scary fan base are down the front whirring arms and legs in all directions. I get very good at ducking as I try and take photos, I must look like a member of Robocop Krauss dancing like that.

We get a set comprising much of the faster stuff but not necessarily the best bits from the new album ‘Art Brut vs Satan’, along with all the classics from their début album ‘Bang Bang Rock & Roll’ but only a few off their underrated second album. If you’re a fan of Art Brut already you’ll know what to expect, if you’re not, I’d skip to the end if I was you.



The band's split with EMI last year, so it's not hard to work out who the ‘Satan’ portrayed on the new record is. After their second, dare I say it slightly commercial album, sorry Eddie, they're back to doing what they do best, taking on sex, drugs, rock 'n' roll and EMI around a few meaty rifts. This time they’ve worked with Frank Black and he seems to have totally bought into the Art Brut spirit.

Eddie Argos, the band’s lead voice, singer wouldn’t be quite the right word, is there to steal the spotlight and duly does so, with his observations on life and his personal manifesto about, well anything he feels like. Such as his love for public transport on ‘The Passenger’.

As expected it only takes a few tracks before he climbs into the crowd and delivers a monologue during ‘Modern Art’ from the centre of the floor before returning to the stage, where most of his ripostes seem to be at the expense of guitarist Jeff aka Jasper Future, particularly before they launch in to ‘Rusted Guns of Milan’, his ode to his right hand.

The only down point is perhaps that the brilliant ‘Emily Kane’ was mainly inaudible as they cranked up the sound which suited rock outs such as ‘Nag Nag Nag’ much better. Then ‘Bad Weekend’ stirs the mosh pit and delivers more bad news for decent photography.



Then there’s a new song about Eddie’s love of comic books and drinking... err... milkshake, ‘even though I'm 28’ obviously entitled ‘DC Comics And Chocolate Milkshake’.

Eddie becomes the first band member I’ve seen at the Rescue Rooms go to the bar for a pint during a set, taking the microphone with him and continuing the song as he goes. On the way back he chats up the crowd as well as slagging off bands who court the mainstream by imitating bands like U2 on ‘Slap Dash For No Cash’. They’re even selling 'Who wants to sound like U2?' t shirts at the merchandising stall. No risk of Art Brut ever becoming mainstream, not matter what EMI may have hoped.

'Formed a Band' is shouted for and eventually delivered as the first song of the encore despite not being set listed. The brilliant first single that they never got to play on ‘Top of the Pops’. They finish with ‘Good Weekend’ with the crowd singing along and sharing Eddie’s glee at having seen his new girlfriend naked, twice.

All great fun but of course, in the end Satan will win and U2 will always be more popular but who cares.

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Brakes, The Royal

On the day that I get an email from British Sea Power, Eamon Hamilton’s former band, informing me that BSP will be playing Regents Park, where they allege Eamon buried 24 cans of Kestrel draught-flow in 2003 but can’t remember where. We happen to be in Derby to see Eamon and his band, Brakes.

Eamon is obviously a fan of The Voluntary Butler Scheme because again this one-man-band is supporting him. Rob doesn’t appear quite as shy as when we saw him last year and is quite chatty with the crowd but he’s still doesn’t look exactly comfortable up there. He’s probably trying too hard now and should just let his considerable talent do the talking. He tells us that he has actually been playing as part of a band but tonight it’s once again just him.

He must be doing better because he can now afford a chair, so that he can sit down as he tinkers away. Not that he can sell us any CD’s still; they’re out of stock, again. Finally though some of his stuff may be freely available, as he promises us he got an album finished and ready to come out.

If you’re not seen him, do so, what he does is really quite original. He’s a very skilful multi-instrumentalist. He uses a recording loop on what he calls his ‘no mates’ box to add his own backing tracks and backing vocals to his music. This would just be a gimmick if he wasn’t so damn good at it. He also plays a few simpler songs tonight, just him, his piano and some wonderfully whimsical lyrics. His half an hour is up far too soon.

Eamon must also be a fan of Camper Van Beethoven as the Brakes open up with ‘Shut Us Down’ a cover of one of their songs, not the first time he’s done a song of theirs. Then we’re into more familiar territory with the traditional opener (or always close to it) ‘Hi! How Are You?’. The recent single ‘Hey Hey’ follows and perhaps hints at a rockier, more frantic side to their third album ‘Touchdown’ which is due out next week. Generally though it’s business as usual, that is as in the usual eccentricity, insanity, fascinating lyrics and great tunes. The usual banter is there and we find out that Eamon is worryingly familiar with the Normanton area of Derby.



They seem to now have more songs, rather than just segments of songs. Some Brakes tracks famously last only a matter of seconds but some of the new stuff makes it over two minutes. That said the ultra brief ‘Consumer Producer’ is played twice back to back because the first rendition wasn’t tight enough. The equally short ‘Comma Comma Comma Full Stop’, a real crowd pleaser, is also played twice although the consensus here was that the first version was better but they resist a third. The briefness of some of their songs enables them to play 29 songs in just over an hour.



The fact that they can only pull small crowds like tonight, at the lesser of the two rooms at the Royal is mystifying. They’re odd to pigeon hole because they cross so many musical genres, often within the same song but a finer and more talented guitar band you would not find. Not that they seem bothered by the small attendance. You get the impression that Eamon and the boys would play to an empty room and still enjoy themselves.

I have positioned myself at guitarist Thomas White’s right elbow in full view of the set list for reference purposes and to pinch later of course. It makes blogging so much easier. They’re not normally a band that bothers with such order in their lives and the temptation for Eamon to deviate from the list visibly grows as the night goes on. 'Stick to the set list' urges Tom, yes please, not too many diversions, I need to blog this.

There’s a mini crisis when they realise that the pineapple isn’t on stage and playing ‘Porcupine or Pineapple?’ without it is unthinkable. Someone fetches it from the dressing room and then after a short appearance on stage, it is thrown back at him which he fumbles. Bruised pineapple then for tomorrow night's gig.



Then after their quirky new single ‘Don't Take Me To Space (Man)’, they do deviate and swap one of their new songs for another new song, which isn’t named, so stuffing up my set listing. Cheers boys.

Then they seem to have more time that they thought so ‘Hold Me In The River’ is added, how could they have thought not to play it. ‘No Return’ is as good and as poignant as ever, except perhaps when Eamon does it solo and oddly some people behind us go all Quo on us during ‘Jackson’. There’s slight consternation when ‘Cheney’ is omitted but as they say, there’s no point, the man's gone.

Then that’s about it, a couple of newies to finish including something called ‘Huevos Rancheros’, which I believe is a Mexican breakfast of eggs!

The Brakes are still producing consistent good, solid music and remain one of the most under appreciated live acts in the country, which is fine. Somehow seeing them somewhere less intimate just wouldn't be right.

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