Monday 26 October - It's a school night but when there is a very good band in town, you just have to make the effort. On my way to The Duchess I walked passed Fibbers where I was surprised to find a couple of policeman lurking near the concrete steps around the back of the Stonebow. Puzzlingly, there was another PC hanging around at the St Saviourgate end of the passage where the front entrance to The Duchess is. I later found out that a Barnsley man had climbed up onto the scaffolding and was threatening to jump off. We never realised he was there, and tragically, he did finally jump to his death at 13:50 on Tuesday.
Back to the gig, and the first support band was Ghosts On The Intercom, a York-based three-piece consisting of; Tom Robinson (Guitar and vocals), Alex Woolgar (drums), and Rich Morley (bass). Tom is from the school of guitar players who likes to wear his instrument like a necklace, affording him the opportunity to spider up the frets with his right hand, performing hammer-ons, pull-offs, and still picking out notes from the chord. It looks flashier than it really is, as evidenced by the fact that he did it for almost every guitar solo he played. That said he was actually a competent player. The vocals were way too shouty for me. Lyrics were completely wasted, something about "feed me a stray cat"? The whole set was very jangly on the ears, with one song sounding pretty much like another. Andy liked them though.
We also agreed to differ on the second band, Sucioperro, another 3-piece, but this time from Ayr in Scotland. The band are; JP Reid (vocals and guitar), Fergus Munro (vocals and drums), and Stewart Chown (bass). They produced an almighty bass sound that made my clothes vibrate. I like it when my clothes vibrate. These were very heavy, and yet surprisingly tuneful, a bit like York's own With One Last Breath. I did manage to make out the titles of a couple of tracks; Dissident Code, and You Can't Lose (What You Don't Have). I think Andy found their black arm-bands with red crosses on them, slightly unnerving.
And so to the head-liners, ManchesterNine Black Alps, who consist of Sam Forrest (vocals, guitar), David Jones (guitar), Martin Cohen (bass), and James Galley (drums). We've seen them twice at The Duchess and they perform superbly to what appears to me to be a loyal York fan-base. Certainly Sam originally came from York, and the band have strong ties to the city. When we saw them last they were touring material from a forthcoming album, Locked Out From The Inside, which they have just released. By tonight this material was fully integrated into their set, which still draws fairly heavily from their debut, Everything Is. NBA are an English Nirvana. Sam growls Cobain-like, while James drums with vast energy. The guitar-work of David and Martin is enough to wake the dead, yet melodic, sometimes as soft as down, yet a volume never dipping below eleven. Bass and lead guitarists even swap for the final two tracks, just because they can. The band came on-stage to the strains of the theme from Antiques Roadshow. Outstanding tracks for me were; the superb Heavier Than Water, Salt Water, and Burn Faster, grunge-stomp Vampire In The Sun, trouser-shaking Every Photograph Steals My Soul, and spaced-out Cold Star. Hell, I liked them all. This was a first-class gig and I dug into my pockets for a copy of their latest album to add to my collection. Very highly recommended.
Tuesday 27 October - Continuing on my much extended weekend, we are out again on yet another school night, this time at The Basement Bar. The evening kicked off with two-fifths of Sheffield band David Woodcock and The Dead Comedians, specifically; Dave (former frontman of punksters Taste Of Shotgun) on guitars and vocals, supported by Chris Saunders on guitar. Most of the songs they played revolved around cigarettes and alcohol, or love lost. Dave sang with a Waits-style growl and invoked images of Hank Williams and Johnny Cash. I missed most of the song titles, except for the outstanding City Lights.
Not a bad start to the evening that had been organised by the second act, Boss Caine, aka GT Turbo, aka Dan Lucas. A York musician, Dan writes and plays music in the Americana style. He has vocals like Neil Diamond, very bass, very smooth. Again, I missed the titles but the songs went somewhere along the lines of; Smoking In My Back Yard, something about Lady Macbeth, Kinda Loving, Anyone Here Seen Hank?, and the highlight for me, Sweet Sorrow Surrender.
The Basement Bar is a very intimate (small) venue, so there were probably only about fifty people tops. But tonight they were hosting a big act, Hope&Social. H&S come from Leeds and regular readers will know they consist of; Simon Wainwright (vocals, guitar, piano), Rich Huxley (guitar, vocals, piano), Jason Miller (bass), and Ed Waring (keyboards). They are currently joined on drums by Mark Ashwell. Sadly, this was Jason's penultimate gig with the band. After a final gig in Leeds on Thursday, he will be hanging up his bass in favour of his family.
Tonight they played most of their album, Architect of this Church. They kicked off with the super hand-clapping Living A Lie. After this they revealed that most of the band were suffering, in varying degrees, with colds. Ed even confessed to a "runny bottom." Sweet. Moving swiftly along, they polished off Stuck Like Glue, Sunlight Hold Me, Drink The Drink, and Red Red Rose. Then they exhorted the crowd to invoke the spirit of Rod Stewart for Stay With Me. It doesn't sound like a huge set-list, but each song was elongated to its maximum and the set was extended with tuneful links between the tracks. Nonetheless, it was all over way too quickly. Rich and Simon came back for an encore sans a PA system. Looking For Answers is a great track that allows for lots of audience participation, and how we participated! It was a great show and at the end Jas came around the audience selling copies of the album, using their pay-what-you-want model of distribution. Please, go and see H&S, or buy their album, for how ever much you want, or download it, or just go and see another band, but just get out there a support live music!
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