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PARSLEY'S COMMLOCK
Concert Review : Holly Golightly and the Brokeoffs, Debaser, 10/05/08
Found myself back at Stockholm's top Debaser club for a performance by my excellent friend Holly Golightly. I hadn't seen her for ages, and it seems like I see her more in Stockholm than in London these days.
Like in London the Stockholm weekend weather was excellent and this meant that more people wanted to stand outside in the venue's smoker-friendly outside bar, than come inside the venue. Support band Crypt Kicker 5 tried to lead the punters indoors 'Pied Piper'-style by playing one song outside. It seemed to be partially successful. They performed gutsy tribal rock & roll like a travelling medicine show in the Wild West. There were occasional forays into the audience, and opportunities for audience members to join in on percussion.
I began to wonder what music DJs would attempt to use to fill the gap between the 2 bands. A fairly bizarre mix of songs with just the tiniest hint of a nod towards a country sound ensued, with the likes of 'Back Of My Hand' by The Jags and 'Picture Book' by The Kinks.
Holly has been on tour with her show for the best part of a year, and as she rightly quipped this means she is pretty good at it. However, it's quite a demanding musical effort these days, as she only has one fellow musician, the extremely nice Lawyer Dave. He uses a fascinating array of home-made drum pedals to imply a full drum kit whilst he strums away up top. Because he sits down, some punters are unaware that there are no pre-recorded drums and it is all happening live.
Her set went down extremely well, with the audience hanging on every note, although they may not have understood all of her words between songs. I myself missed understanding that a song was dedicated to me via reference to the stated reasons I was thrown out of a band last year.
Holly was only allowed one encore, but it was clear that the audience wanted more, and I'm sure she'll be invited back at the earliest opportunity. The apres-gig was an extremely enjoyable new wave affair with the likes of The Ramones, The Smiths and The Undertones, to name only three. The dance floor was full but friendly and remained so till the end.
Concert Review - Sparks: Halfnelson (1972), Islington Academy 16/05/08
Went out to experience the first of 21 concerts of albums by Sparks. I was very interested in the early albums. Would the original musicians appear? Would there be any bonus tracks? Would the support acts - hand-picked for the occasion - bear any relation to the album being performed? Soon, all was answered.
The accompanying music and ambience was firmly rooted in 2008, and not touching the 1972 Sparks origins. The support was a Welsh guy called Rod Thomas who kicked off musical loops to accompany himself onstage. It was reasonably interesting and laid down a bizarre friendly karma about the event which didn't quite square with the cool rather more streetwise vibe that Sparks give off in my head.
Everyone I'd asked about it had slagged off the Islington Academy venue. I was certainly no fan of the drum podium and predictable accompanying boomy bass drum sound, but it was delightful to get 'small gig' close to the guys as they performed many of these songs live for the first time.
On vocals Russell Mael was sporting a kind of 'matted down' Liza Minelli hair look, and at one point he bewailed his cheap hairspray (from Boots, he told us) leaking into his eyes. Cheap? From Boots? Surely not! He was sporting a bright red suit and black shirt, whilst on keyboards brother Ron had his usual white shirt and normal tie. I was hoping he was going to try a perm wig to take his hair back to how it had looked in those early days.
The Halfnelson songs have a way of changing rhythm and being interesting and quirky in a 'non commercial' way that came into its own in the early seventies. However, from the way the audience and myself knew them so well, and were filling in any backing vocal gaps live, you'd have thought they were church hymns that had been sung for hundreds of years.
The final song from the album was dedicated to Todd Rundgren, who Russell explained had not only produced this first album, but also had the guts to put it out on his own label when everyone else had turned it down.
Ron switched to/from piano/organ sounds effortlessly. He and the 3 very young looking backing musicians made use of music stands, which was very reasonable given the 257 songs (!) they will be performing over the forthcoming concerts.
For the encores Russell explained they would be trying to add in the odd obscure song/B-side and tonight's was 'England'. He mentioned that in the final concert, where they perform their new album, they will also perform songs voted for through their website http://www.allsparks.com/ (if you're bored, please feel free to vote for my personal favourites, B-sides 'Lost & Found' or 'Marry Me'). One down, twenty to go!
parsley@gardenrecords.com [www.gardenrecords.com]
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