Friday, November 02, 2007
Three gigs in four days.
After working in a more southerley office for most of the week, I return home for a very busy four days. Thursday I was at Cadogan Hall for Suzanne Vega. A poncey place if ever there was (£3-50 a bottle of Peroni) it was a cross between a church and a local theatre. This was the first time for a while I had seen Ms Vega with a full band and whereas her set probably had too many new songs in it, we did get most of her associated hits including both versions of Toms Diner. Incidentally her new album returns to her writing about living in New York as per this classic. She did Blood Makes Noise and Left Of Center only accompanied by her bass player who managed an industrial sound not unlike the record of the former.
Friday we ventured to Brixton for The Twang. Having got down the front for the support, Little Man Tate, a Chasndave esque Artic Monkeys type band, my friend says that it won’t be a moshy gig. How wrong was this assumption? Very. Big mosh, a couple of fights and lots of stewards through water over you!
To be honest I wasn’t impressed with Little Man Tate. If you are singing about real life at least do it with a bit of irony. There are too many bands trying to be the Artics at the moment, and that genre isn’t great to start with. Actually when I really think about it they were pretty dire, with the singer a smug git! The Twang on the other hand are a little different to draw an absolute comparison, a rocky Streets maybe. Bravely, they put ‘Either Way’ early on in the set and got away with it. Other highlights were ‘Two Lovers’ & ‘Push The Ghosts’. Before the gig we found a great place in Balham to drink called the Balham Bowls Club. It is an old Bowling Club Pavilion that has been refurbished into a very nice pub, with a gastro bit at the back. Bitburger and Cruzcampo were among the choices on draft. Very good, and imagine we shall be back at some stage.
After a trip to Cardiff to see a friend, I managed to get back to the Shepherds Bush Empire to see Ian Hunter, the lead vocalist of Mott The Hoople. His latest album, Shrunken Heads is pretty good and whilst doing a few tracks from that, including the great ‘World Was Round’ opening the encore, he played a great selection of Hoople classics. He ended with ‘All The Young Dudes’ with two other Mott members on stage as well as Jeese Malin, Tracie Hunter and the late Mick Ronson’s wife.
Friday we ventured to Brixton for The Twang. Having got down the front for the support, Little Man Tate, a Chasndave esque Artic Monkeys type band, my friend says that it won’t be a moshy gig. How wrong was this assumption? Very. Big mosh, a couple of fights and lots of stewards through water over you!
To be honest I wasn’t impressed with Little Man Tate. If you are singing about real life at least do it with a bit of irony. There are too many bands trying to be the Artics at the moment, and that genre isn’t great to start with. Actually when I really think about it they were pretty dire, with the singer a smug git! The Twang on the other hand are a little different to draw an absolute comparison, a rocky Streets maybe. Bravely, they put ‘Either Way’ early on in the set and got away with it. Other highlights were ‘Two Lovers’ & ‘Push The Ghosts’. Before the gig we found a great place in Balham to drink called the Balham Bowls Club. It is an old Bowling Club Pavilion that has been refurbished into a very nice pub, with a gastro bit at the back. Bitburger and Cruzcampo were among the choices on draft. Very good, and imagine we shall be back at some stage.
After a trip to Cardiff to see a friend, I managed to get back to the Shepherds Bush Empire to see Ian Hunter, the lead vocalist of Mott The Hoople. His latest album, Shrunken Heads is pretty good and whilst doing a few tracks from that, including the great ‘World Was Round’ opening the encore, he played a great selection of Hoople classics. He ended with ‘All The Young Dudes’ with two other Mott members on stage as well as Jeese Malin, Tracie Hunter and the late Mick Ronson’s wife.
# posted by Rich @ 2:42 PM 
