The Dusk Brothers

Oh dear, I'm in a hurry again. Here's an Oxfordbands review from a couple of years ago. It was all Dunkirk spirit that night as ace local fest Truck had been cancelled due to Biblical weather. I was happy, as it meant I could go after I'd been away when it was postponed. I flew to Europe the morning after this gig. I was hungover.

THE EVENINGS/ KING FURNACE/ BEAR IN THE AIR – GRINNING SPIDER, THE X, 20/7/07


Following monstrous downpours, and just hours after the news that Truck has been postponed, it’s pleasing to see so many of Oxford’s music fans prepared to make the trip to The X, to share a beer and commiserate over the sudden death of a long anticipated weekend.

Plenty of opportunity for commiseration during Bear In The Air’s set, because it does very little to impinge on your consciousness, despite the volume. With tinkly high keys and emotive vocals always fluttering at the edge of falsetto, Bear In The Air are essentially a pub rock version of Muse. Some of their songs could perhaps be twisted into an entertaining Bond theme bombast, if only their performance wasn’t so sludgy, and Bear In The Air are resolutely earthbound. Sorry, that’s an obvious gag – but not nearly so obvious as their arrangements.

Thank heaven for King Furnace, then, who bring some sense of occasion back to the stage, along with entertaining rock pomp. With a vocalist who looks like BBC man Tim Bearder’s cooler brother (actually, doesn’t Tim already have one of those?) prancing around the stage howling out some foot tapping cock rock, a nice sprightly drummer and a guitarist with a full-fat sound, King Furnace are guaranteed to keep you amused, even if they’re unlikely to change any lives along the way. The whole pantomime affair brings back rather fond memories of Marconi’s Voodoo. Good stuff.

We’ve said it many a time, but The Evenings are one of our favourite local acts, always up for a bit of reinvention. Until recently they’d taken rather a lengthy hiatus and now they’ve returned as a trio, with a clutch of new material. When not acting the giddy goat, Seb’s keyboards are still a winning mixture of cheap rave and Vangelis, whilst Jo is currently playing bass with far more authority than the old days, and it seems that stripping down the lineup has worked well. The newer songs have a surprisingly lyrical bent, all slowly evolving vocal melodies and lovelorn melancholy, and they fit rather well with the electro rock backing we know so well.

But, perhaps this new found delicacy needs a better voice to carry it through. Nothing wrong with Mark’s voice, really, but it doesn’t really have the malleability to truly coax the beauty from the melodies, nor the character to capture the emotion of the lyrics. Plus, we don’t want anything to detract Mark from playing drums, as he does this so bloody well, displaying fluidity and power simultaneously. A couple of criticisms, then, but The Evenings are still up there with the best.