Funicle For A Friend

I quite like this review, it's amusing, and sums up for me what was great about many of the gigs at the late lamented Port Mahon: no rules, no inhibitions, no audience, no profits, no pretensions. Bliss. Seeing as we're all about the asides in this review, here's an un related slice of life. Last night on the way back from a gig I was listening to my pre-Pod (AKA Sony Walkman), which has one of those Bass Boost buttons that they used to have. I discovered that if you use this facility whilst listening to early Sebadoh it just makes the lo fi tape hiss really really loud. So I did. It was like Lou Barlow was playing to me from the bottom of a large vat of screwed up tracing paper.

WIRE ROOMS/ DIE_FUNKT/ EGYPTIAN DEATH/ FROGSPAWN – Off Field, Port Mahon, 15/6/08

No matter how great they were, every urban bluesman who survived after 1960 turned in some flabby music. However, those who were least guilty were John Lee Hooker and the recently departed Bo Diddley, whose recordings remained energising whilst their counterparts traded graceless solos, because they never strayed far from those simple rhythmic patterns which speak so directly to our primal side. Frogspawn’s Diddley tribute is deeply aware of the power of that classic beat, and drops into ace Bo shuffles just when you think the guitar and drums duo have lost their way: seriously, this set starts like a bad photocopy of Hella, with all the gradations smudged out, and ends up a clinically rocking delight, with big riffs and beery growling vocals (aside: is singing off-mike to alt rock what vocoders are to house?). Joyous stuff.

Despite admitting they were unhappy with the gig, Egyptian Death continue the high standard, slowly coaxing a queasy hum of white noise and vocal ululations whilst crouched around a variety of sound sources (aside: is sitting in a huddle to drone improv what foot-on-monitor is to cock rock?). The rather wonderful effect is like a sonic version of that endless uncomfortable moment when you realise you’ve forgotten someone’s name whilst introducing them. To a cyborg.

Far less subtlety from Die_funkt, who is billed as minimal techno, but whose set is busier than Ricardo Villalobos or Basic Channel, even whilst it lacks the complexity of Warptronica or the structural savvy of Detroit. As arid beats go it’s fine, if better when keeping to an electro pulse and avoiding IDM stutters, but Die_funkt (aside: is the underscore to techno what the umlaut is to metal?) loses us completely when he starts stuffing tired beats behind Joy Division, Sabbath and The Human League. Yuk.

Thankfully, Wire Rooms’ set is brilliant…even though they’re truthfully quite crap. Imagine some youthclub punks jamming with Suicide, but add hilariously lopsided dancing, keyboards that make Les Dawson look like Vladimir Horowitz and the sound of some crash cymbals running the 100m hurdles (no aside: we can’t tear attention away from this maelstrom). Wire Rooms are deeply likable, which can so often be better than merely being any good.