Sleepy, Hollow

I recently became the World Handjob Champion. I had to beat off stiff competition.

Sorry.


THE EMPTY VESSELS/ SAMUEL ZASADA/ NUMBERNINE – Moshka, Bully, 9/4/10


Numbernine have been away for a few years, but they still peddle a perky, carbonated britpop that is immensely enjoyable, if slightly hackneyed. In their time away from the stage, they’ve had a slight shuffle and Alex Horwill now plays drums (although it may be him on the somewhat superfluous samples and backing tracks), and he has a natural bounce that suits the songs even if a couple of golden clunkers tell of a lack of rehearsal. The bass is still the best thing about the band, supple and springy yet capable of building some pretty solid rock edifices on occasion. It s only the lead vocals that are mild let down: plenty of pep, but they do tend to shove falsetto in place of melodic invention.

The songs are of a high calibre, even if most of them sound as though they’re being beamed in from 1994. “My New Mantra” tries to stretch the envelope with a proggy Eastern flavour, but ends up feeling dyspeptically like Gene playing Zepellin, and the band are happiest with tracks like “London”, reeking of Camden market and redolent of NME inky fingers gripping pints in The Good Mixer. All in all, it’s good to have Numbernine back, they make a great unpretentious pop noise, and have a couple of cracking tunes, not least “Talk”, a melodic barnstormer that still reminds us happily of The Longpigs at their best, five years since we first heard it.

Samuel Zasada’s first number has fantastic folky intricacy and rectilinear motorik groove mashed together like Pentangle through the square window. Later, gorgeous three-part harmonies wash over a scuzzy tale of saying “’Fuck you’ to The Man”, as if Lou Barlow had started writing for Peter, Paul & Mary. Last time we saw Samuel, his voice knocked us back, but that was pretty much all there was to like; since then he has placed himself in the middle of an excellent trio and thought very intelligently about arrangements, concocting a dense sonic fug that truly suits his rich, gothic voice, but that doesn’t obscure some sprightly melodies. Samuel hasn’t been content to strum a few chords in flyblown open mics, letting his impressive voice do all the work, he’s clearly been honing his music into something a little bit special. The work is paying off.

Speaking of good singers, get an earful of Matt Greenham from The Empty Vessels, who has a cracking pair of lungs and a love of wide-straddling rawk howling that’s only a set of leather kecks and a three figure a day drug habit away from the glory days of MTV. The band is well-drilled, and unrepentantly retrospective, happy in the warm, yet shallow, pools of classic rock. This is refreshingly honest, and feels like coming back to homegrown veg after too long with the polished, perfectly shaped carrots in Tesco’s: you know, tasty and caked in mud and, quite possibly, shaped like a willy.

And that’s all great of course, but only for about fifteen minutes. By twenty not even a kickass flailing limb-o-matic drummer can stop the attention wandering (we realised, from staring vacuously at the guitarist’s T shirt, that the Os in The Doors’ logo look a lot like coffee beans, for example). An interesting noise like a rat gnawing a modem turned out to be a faulty pedal, and we began to realise, as another identical song started chugging along, that old school was rapidly becoming old hat. All of which feels pretty hard on The Empty Vessels, who are clearly having a blast and probably don’t want to change the musical world any, but this didn’t alter the fact that we weren’t really young enough, drunk enough, or from Wantage enough to fully enjoy these threadbare rock archaisms. This is a very good band, but one that doesn’t stand up to criticism very well; if you’re enjoying the music, it’s probably not because you’re thinking about it in any great detail, or thinking about anything whatsoever except the advisability of a ninth pint or whether you’ve got a chance with the one over there with the black jeans.

As their forebears Reef might have asked mid-song, “Alright now?”. Yes, we are alright, thanks. Alright, but not, you know, ecstatic.

Come Nine With Me

I got a message through Nightshift yesterday. Ulysse Dupasquier, who was reviewed previously here. He asked that I remove his name from the review, as it's the only thing that comes up if you Google his name, and he's a bit embarrassed. Well, I'm not going to rewrite history, but now I've written this, it should be the second page in a websearch, so if you've just read read how rubbish Ulysse once was, you can now read this and be reassured by him that he's much better.

There. Call it being neutral...

NUMBERNINE/ TURBULENCE/ PATSY DECLINE, Klub Kakofanney, Wheatsheaf, 3/6/05

Long ago, in that fuzzy magazine clipping of musical history called the indie eighties, The Jazz Butcher sang about the "Southern Mark Smith". Patsy Decline goes one better. She's the Southern female Mark E. Smith. It's all there: the fag, the slouch, the drawling goblin brainpunk delivery, the lyrical obtuseness (featuring ignorant astronauts and a factory of lies).

To complete the illusion, accompanist Twizz Twangle spends the majority of the set fiddling ineffectually with leads and amp dials, recalling the dark side of Smith's stage persona, and the backing track (whcih completely drowns out anything Twizz actually plays) boasts a throbbing drum machine and insistent bass that wouldn't have been out of place on I Am Kurious Oranj. Naturally this sort of thing is flawed and unfinished, but Patsy's restless energy is enough to carry the show. Much ink has been spilt on the social, political and aesthetic legacies of punk, but the anarchic brio of Patsy's set recalls a John The Postman era when everything was valid and, what's more, everything was a bloody good laugh.

Full marks to Turbulence for having the guts to play after their singer was refused entry at soundcheck because he's barred form the venue...and nul points to the singer himself, who must have suspected that this might happen. And him a promoter too. Tut. Anyway, for grabbing the bull by the horns and general the-show-must-go-on trooperdom, I shall forever defend the boys from Turbulence. Which is lucky, because musically they're absolutely dire.

We'll forgive the fact that the guitarist can't sing, and knows none of the words, as it's not his job. We'll forgive the hesitant performance, because presumably the entire band dynamic has taken a hefty knock off kilter. What we won't forgive is that they aim for a sort of muso psychedelia, but what they hit is about as cosmic as a pile of nail clippings on an Oasis tab sheet, and the fact that then horrible keyboard patches make The Krypton Factor theme sound like Klaus Schulze. Let's just stick our fingers in our ears and ruminate on what great sports they are, eh?

Anything would sound powerful after that, but numbernine's amphetamine Britpop packs a fair wallop. Soaring choruses, songs about London, jaunty new wave music hall breaks - by rights this should sound anachronistic and tired, yet somehow numbernine are giving this dead horse one more gallop round the steeplechase. Roaring tracks like "365" and "Talk" recall a particularly bellicose version of The Longpigs, and if a couple of the weaker moments recall Menswe@r, at least the emphasis is firmly on the "swear".

numbernine's main strength is surely the twin vocals, which have a punchy presence, but are capable of delicate close harmonies when necessary. The rhythm section is pleasingly tight too. Despite this glowing review, there's still a little something missing from numbernine: musically speaking, perhaps they need to add a few personalised accessories to their second hand clothes. Still, the foundations of a good local band have been laid. Let's see if they have the dedication and ideas to finish the job.