up ‘Cover Your Tracks’, the temperature drops several degrees and the walls vanish. And then it gets better. Truly, the double falsetto harmony of ‘Coast’ is Just Handshakes have been brought one of the most beautiful things I have in to support at the thirteenth hour ever heard. There is poignant sense and there could not be a more fitting of loss in all this too, with Rory and Rob Wright bunch of Indie-viduals. When Clara Emilia murmuring the words forlornly, performs, it’s like being chatted up by an that plucks at your soul like Owen at his impossibly shy and cute girl, while the Omnichord. ‘Inkjet Lakes’ and ‘Broken boys pump out rhythms and tunes from Wing’ both come over as passionate Grammatics Vs Blue Janpan via Sowetto. Outwardly simple, billet-doux to the Leeds scene, but it is Roses/Just Handshakes but deeply complex. And they say I will the Metro-pleasing (‘a night of covers’) (We’re British) “marry a nice man who looks like a Blue cover of ‘Killing Moon’ that SWALKs @ Nation of Shopkeepers Peter presenter”. Which is good. the whole thing. God, I feel lucky – I’ve No way am I moving. Not for anyone. I just been serenaded by two of the most There is no room left in the space before got here at 7.15 for this seat and I will beautiful voices in Leeds. I hardly notice the stage; the atmosphere is stifling, but not be intimidated into moving. Not by the other 200 infatuees. Laura and Owen both look cool – Owen anyone. for once looking the weary-eyed veteran, Rob Wright Fair to say, Grammatics and Blue Roses Laura the terrified but calm neophyte. But as the pair, accompanied by Rory, fans are hardly terrifying – not like Emilia and new drummer James, strike lose it a bit – It’s loud and aggressive but emptying fast before your eyes. The final act of neatly deconstructing the drums reminds us that this is just a show and these are nice boys after all. Which is quite scary.
Motorhead or NMA fans - but this is a very special night (kudos to Fezz). Very special indeed.
British Wildlife @ The Brudenell Social Club, Leeds
Leeds-based label and promoter British Wildlife seem to think a Sunday at the beginning of August is a good time to showcase some examples of what’s happening in the world of noisy guitar combos right now. Me, I think it’s an excellent idea. The Tupelov Ghost can’t play because of, would you believe, Swine Flu, and despite being a one man mosh pit, Twisted’s singer keeps complaining about a dreadful sore throat. The rest of the band thump out spritely and zesty punk pop songs and the singer finishes the set slumped behind an amp stack, spent. The night threatens to turn into a music themed episode of Casualty as What Price, Wonderland’s drummer announces after every song that he feels really, really ill. This is probably at least partly due to the fact that the trio play an exhilarating mash up of post-punk, jazz and thrash metal with most songs flashing by at a dizzying and drummer disabling 100mph. Holy State don’t complain of any maladies but then they don’t say much of anything really. The lumbering predictability of their soulless and trudging metal could be the result of blocked sinuses though. Although displaying no signs of illness at all, Uprights nonetheless possess one of the biggest and filthiest bass sounds I’ve heard in a long time. The trio display an understanding of the kind of economic invention practiced by The Fall or Wire with an added undertone of incipient craziness. Guitarist/singer Alex Greenwood hides the evil glint that must surely lurk in his eyes behind a pair of welders goggles. vibrations 33