THE
POP GROUP
The
Haunt, Brighton, Tues 5th May
When
frontman Mark Stewart launches the set with the words “we are all
prostitutes”, the title and opening line of perhaps their most
classic number, it might signal a statement of intent. Last time round it had been the set closer. Clearly, this won't
be a night for messing about.
But
it might also suggest a deeper purpose. The last gig had been built
around the 1980 album 'We Are Time'. This time its
all about the brand new release 'Citizen Zombie',
and they're getting the known numbers out the way. Indeed, the title
track is the very next to be played. Though it was somewhat controversially pitchforked by Pitchfork, from
where I'm standing this makes for a better gig. The fresh songs
dominate the set and make the band sound... well, fresher.
They seem to run the gamut from quite bouncy numbers to the sinister
and discordant. (Stewart back-announces one recited vocal piece as “a
bit weird, that one”. And coming from him…)
I
said last time round that the curse that befalls bands is that they
get better, and that their incendiary yet
disorientating blend of syncopation and dislocation could easily
suffer from such a fate. But possibly they have got the better sort
of better, from the days they were channelling some force they could
barely control. Yet they're still not too
accomplished, if things are no longer right on the edge of chaos
they're still closer to it than today's health and safety regulations
normally allow.
I
even take to fancying they sound less like a reunited band getting
back in the saddle than a band taking their next step – like they'd
just been timewarped from 1980 to now, and were picking up where they
left off. With typical impassioned hyperbole, Stewart was recently insisting to the Guardian that today's bleak
times were precisely the reason to reignite things: “We always
wanted to be a pop group...We’re getting right into the belly of
the beast. And this is the time to be there.”
And
seeing them live you could almost believe him...
The
afore-mentioned 'We Are All Prostitutes' not from
Brighton but... well, you'll guess where. Still ringing true today...
SQUAREPUSHER
Brighton
Dome, Fri 8th May
The
only way I can think to describe electronica artist Squarepusher (aka
Tom Jenkinson) is that he's to dance music what modern jazz was to
trad. He twists, turns and distorts the beats into
near-unrecognisable shapes, marshalls them into unpredictable
compositions. And yet you feel at the heart of it is someone who
loves old-style dance, loves the feeling of surrender to wave after
wave of pummelling beats like a blissful form of drowning, someone
who's remaking it his way than someone arriving with lofty notions to
improve it. It remains dancey throughout. ('Modern
dance' might even be a better term than klunkers like 'intelligent
drum'n'bass'. But it would make everyone think of Pere Ubu so it
isn't much good.)
The
result's like a cross between an arcade game on mind-altering drugs
and the music of the spheres, a pretty virtuous combination indeed.
The beats are so heavy you feel as much as hear
them, while the visuals are keyed by the music (by some electronic
process I don't profess to understand) – so are in perfect time and
give a perfect synaesthesic experience. The overall experience is
mesmerising.
Last
time I saw Squarepusher, in this very venue some seven or eight years
ago, he seemed able to play bass and keyboards simultaneously. This
time his bass stood propped up behind him like Chekhov's gun, with everyone waiting for it to go off. And yet I think the set
sounded better without it. Jenkinson more or less started out as a
bassist, and is an accomplished player. But he's almost too
accomplished, the virtuoso playing can bring back something I hoped
dance's beats had buried – muso-ness. The bass could make it jazzy
in all the wrong ways. While with pure electronica it all sounds...
purer somehow, more unearthly, more difficult to
grasp.
In
fact he only picked the thing up for the encore. Shorn of the fencing
mask he'd sported for the whole of the main set, he first picked out
idle notes as if mucking around casually at home. They only slowly
built up into a fuller, more textured number, much more leisurely
than the frenetic force of before. He mostly played notes so
high-register I thought he must have switched to guitar, and needed
to be told otherwise afterwards. After the sheer sonic shock of the
main set, after which almost all the audience were on the feet, it
was perhaps a strange sidestep. But the music was effective and
demonstrated the variety of sounds he's capable of.
This
is from... well, for once the actual gig...
ANNA
CALVI
Brighton
Dome, Sat 9th May
Anna
Calvi must be one of the most theatrical performers I've seen lately,
and I write that as someone who was only recently at Marc Almond. She purposefully strides
on stage after the rest of the band, and finishes the gig with fans
throwing flowers to her. She remains slightly aloof, rarely speaking.
Despite a slightly alarming resemblance to Simmonds from 'Agents
of Shield', with her trademark tied-back hair, scarlet
lipstick and flamenco outfits, and her equally distinctive voice
she's very much a self-identifying star.
At
the same time she's just as much a guitarist, strapping on at the
start of the gig then keeping it to hand throughout. As someone known
to reject the very concept of guitar solos as pointless busywork...
well truth be told, at times I found them too excessive, but mostly
coped with them surprisingly well. They seemed expressive rather than
merely flamboyant, connected to the rest of the music rather than
interrupting it. The guitar became her voice when her voice wasn't
being her voice.
She
often plays in the interchange where rock'n'roll meets country, the
twangy, trebly echoey sound of 'Ghost Riders in the
Sky'. And in general the music manages to keep a foot in
rootsy without ever sounding regressive or constrained. She even
manages a Bruce Springsteen cover without losing me, something I
would have previously thought impossible. Overall the music can hone
in on quite small sounds, then break into explosive bursts. The woman
to her (stage) right bustles between a bewildering array of
instruments, squeeze-box, xylophone, scraping a bow across a
cymbal...
It's
impressive, it's never short of invention. And yet, for all that its
brimming with passion, somehow there wasn't enough heart
to it. You can admire it, you can like it, but can you love it? To quote my thoughts on betterness in full from that old Pop Group review:
”The
curse that normally befalls bands isn't that they get worse but that
they get better. They become tighter, more
professional, and lose the looseness – the unstable elements that
had made them so idiosyncratic and unpredictable.”
Some
of those present who'd seen her before did suggest she has got better
in this way. Though she could have been born better for all I'd know.
All I can say is betterness beset her that night.
Embedding
disallowed but follow this link for actual gig footage.
Coming soon! More of this sort of thing...
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