Thaumaturge Overkill

Here's my thought for the day, for anyonre who works in publishing, law or the music industry: an infinite number of monkeys may well be able to write Hamlet, but it just takes one lying hyena to make them sign over the rights.

4 OR 5 MAGICIANS/ GRESHAM FLYERS/ WHITE SAILS – Swiss Concrete, Wheatsheaf, 17/4/09

White Sails construct frail, rickety indie edifices that teeter on the edge of collapse, yet somehow stay together. As a band they’re hesitant, but manage to keep the songs afloat, coming across as a YTS version of The Wannadies. Half the songs are performed by Stornoway’s Ollie Steadman, and whilst he won’t be causing Brian Briggs any sleepless nights, his intimate voice sneaks into the songs charmingly, even if he could do with projecting a little more; sadly, other lead vocal duties are taken by Swiss visitor Ulysse Dupasquier, whose weedy, cracked voice is as limp and nourishing as a Little Chef salad garnish, and whose magical inverse stage presence sucks any life out of the band. Some very promising elements on display, but some serious homework to do, too.

Gresham Flyers are named after a vintage pushbike, sell immaculately crafted split EPs with bands called The Pale Corners and Wintergreen, and have songs named “Factory Records Museum” and “Berry Buck Mills Stipe”: exactly what we’d come up with if we wanted to parody a Swiss Concrete booking, basically. But why be cynical, when the performance is such fun, all ungainly spasming, tinny guitars and sherbet lemon keyboards. They remind us by turn of a pre-fame Pulp, The Wedding Present, Bis and Coventry’s Ludicrous Lollipops, a band so obscenely obscure we feel guilty mentioning them. But what better way to describe these indie archaeologists than with a defunct band you’re even less likely to have come across? And they have Fall-referencing coloured vinyl. Bloody great fun.

Intensity levels change for Brighton’s 4 Or 5 Magicians, who play bouncy indie with a shiny, muscular carapace, which is oddly like a hi-octane cross between The Senseless Things and The Foo Fighters. The room may be alarmingly empty in terms of punters, but the band fill every corner with their dense guitars, thumping drums and clean arcing vocal lines. We’ll be honest, we weren’t mad on the songs (although the opener was pleasingly like a steroid pumped A House), but we’re all for any band who can look out into yet another empty, listless toilet venue and play with such passion and joy regardless.