I think the saying goes “good things come to those who wait”. And in the three-and-a-half years since I first came across this band, their first EP is available at last. And happily, the power and astonishing control that they display over their music in the live environment is carried over well when recorded.
As a result of an early deviation for food first, I missed both Action Directe and Uberbyte – of which both sets I’ve heard many good things about. My excuse for missing them? I hadn’t eaten all day, really, and I seriously needed that meal!
I’ve done a good job in recent years in catching up with a number of bands that I missed in my younger years, that became huge influences on the music that I listen to and the music that I play when DJing. And happily enough, all of them have lived up to their reputation – […]
We last came across JP Anderson in these pages covering his last album REFrame, in which he made the jump from an unsigned, underground artist to a signed artist with an apparently ever-growing fanbase.
Contrary to seemingly popular belief, “romantic” and/or “gothic” doom metal does not end with My Dying Bride. While that band have somehow come through what might say was a critically weak patch to return rejuvenated with a couple of cracking albums, peer behind them to the numerous bands they have clearly influenced and there are […]
Before you even start listening to this CD – and particularly if you know XP8’s recent history – it is plainly obvious the band have some scores to settle. And indeed, perhaps they have – previous album HRS:MIN:SEC, while it had it’s moments, was a little derivative and at points, er, a bit soft.
Is it a cheap shot to blame the Prodigy for what Pendulum have become? Or maybe it isn’t. After all, although they were already rising stars in the drum’n’bass scene, it was their simply awesome reworking of Voodoo People that thrust them into the limelight, and since then their insistence on merging the ideals of […]
First band on were Skinjob, an act that have been around for a while but somehow I have managed to miss every single time they have played locally to me. So, I was looking forward to this. And immediately I was disappointed by the dreadful sound: somehow the sound was a muddy mess, with the […]
The venue was a very odd one. The Grosvenor House Hotel on Charter Square, a hotel that has clearly seen better days, and indeed will soon be gone forever when the block in which it resides is demolished for the new Sevenstone retail quarter. The oh-so-slightly tatty interior was like a relic from the seventies, […]
It is now over three years since a friend first suggested I go see this band live, and it has been interesting to see their development over this time. They were an impressive live band three years hence, and they are still one now. In just thirty-five minutes they played an intricately constructed set that […]
…with a lot of attention paid to catching up with a number of old friends there, I paid little or no attention to the support acts at all (which is reasonably rare for me). So I’ll skip them and move onto the main event.
Note: An edited version of this review appeared in Alternative Magazine Issue 09
Due to all kinds of issues with getting across the pennines (both Snake and Woodhead were shut on Saturday afternoon), friends staying with us weren’t at ours ’til six, and with food to eat and then the need to get ready before heading out, we almost totally missed Uberbyte.
It’s time, perhaps, to address the cliche of the “difficult second album”. Well, here is the perfect chance, really – the debut by ESA was so good that it is difficult not to be having memories of that in the back of one’s mind when reviewing the new one. One similarity becomes immediately obvious – […]
It was really bloody strange seeing prot0type live in my home town.
I’m still not sure how much I like the Leadmill as a gig venue. While the layout is great – a wide stage, and a good sound system that allows for just about everyone to see the gig – it never feels quite right. So it was a good thing that in the main, the […]
Getting in a little late, I missed the beginning of Kloq, but got to see the majority of a set I had been looking forward to seeing.
Yet another band that I have been waiting years to see, first we had to endure two local bands that were really not good. The first were very-much Blondie influenced (to the point of playing a cover of Call Me), while the second were scratchy punk-pop where the silence between each song was probably longer […]
First, I should mention the support band. A band from the south-west called Undercut, who were really rather good. Not at all the type of band I would expect to see supporting a band like TYG, but maybe that was half the fun. A five-piece alternative rock band, with passing nods in the music to […]
Let’s get the comparisons out of the way first, shall we? This sounds very much like a Skinny Puppy creation. Not the post-millenium incarnation, but the prime-80s/90s version, where layer upon layer of sound is added to the mix, with unsettling samples, barely coherant vocals and a grimy, darkened feel to proceedings. Add to the […]
