NME Tour at the Carling Academy, Bristol, last night. Threatened with being returned home after a particularly gruelling post-viral coughing fit, I did make it to the show. The familiar sounds of Mumm-Ra assaulted us as soon as we got in and we realised quickly that we'd made the stupid mistake of missing part of the set. In fact we only heard three songs, luckily they finished on Out of the Question. Initial impressions were that the larger venue sapped some of Mumm-Ra's natural charisma, and that they were a bit more polished and distant than they were at the Louisiana back in November. Never mind ...
The Horrors were worse than bad. To his credit Faris kept his vocals well down in the mix - a neat reversal of the usual ego-infested turn it up to 11 attitude of most middle-class art school vocalist wimps. Problem was it made the sub-Specter wall of sound racket sound even worse, every song sounded the same and the band had about as much charisma as the Pope asleep. Expect them to all hold full time jobs in insurance or the media by 2008.
The View were okay, nothing special. The sound was a bit flat, and they show why drum, bass, rhythm and lead guitar alone are so limiting on sound texture and why many of the groups in the 80s got it right by ditching or enhancing the classic four piece elements. They won't endure, although I suspect they'll lead more interesting lives than the Horrors, being nice working class Scottish lads!
The Automatic were superb! Pennie goes into nutter mode INSTANTLY, no warm up required. The sound is crisp and clear, everything mixed just right. Pennie was over our side so we could watch his simian antics and Tokyo Olympics style gymnastics unhindered by heads. A class act all round!
To sum up the evening would have been excellent if only Mumm-Ra and the Automatic had been given the other two slots to fill, and if that bitch in the Mumm-Ra Out of the Question tee shirt had done the decent thing and given it to me in exchange for Trin's hand knitted puce hoody, rather than clutching it proprietorially throughout the show.
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