Phoning it in

Dispatches from the back of the venue

RIYL: Slint

  • Pale Blue Eyes & Shaking Hand

    Pale Blue Eyes & Shaking Hand

    The Devon / Sheffield crossover Dream pop combo delight a Wednesday night crowd in Manchester

    Support comes from Shaking Hand who I’ve already seen at one of the excellent Hot Take band showcase gigs at Yes Manchester. They strike up an unhurried, circular groove and there’s something immediately appealing about them as the venue fills and people gather to listen rather than ignore, as can happen with supports. We’re in good hands with this unassuming 3 piece – guitar / vocalist playing distinctive weaving guitar parts, a drummer pattering away with jazzy flourishes but with a pleasing kick, and a bassist who frequently doubles as a twin lead – playing the higher register of the instrument. They have a post-rock edge to them, a little bit of Slint or early Tortoise perhaps, or the fabled Leeds band Hood and while the pieces they play are enjoyably drifty at times – they aren’t averse to wrong-footing us with a sudden tempo change, a burst of noise, a scrape of strings here or a cheeky rhythmic curveball there. They wear their guitars well, they play studiously but with a confidence that suggests they know how they good they are- I like them a lot and, judging by the applause, everyone else does too. There appears to be no recorded material available but hopefully they’re busy in a studio somewhere bottling that magic.

    On to the headliners. I’m a bit behind the curve with Pale Blue Eyes but Piccadilly Records piqued my interest and I’ve been enjoying their latest record ‘New Place’ which it turns out is their 3rd album so I’ve some catching up to do. For a band who trade in dreamy, shoegazey pop they have a disarmingly chummy and light hearted air about them – in fact their footwear remains un-gazed at and they spend most of the time looking and grinning at each other and the audience – it turns out PBE here to have a good time and so should we.

    The band have toured with Slowdive and they share a love of using guitars and keyboards to create a sea bed for the songs to float on but they have their own distinct sound that is sparkly, upbeat and distinctly pop-tastic. Lots of major chords, and at times this sounds like ‘The Big Music’ – think Simple Minds in their early 80s pomp but also informed by Stereolab, and the locked groove of Neu! or La Dusseldorf – but just when it seems they might lean a bit too much into that well-worn trench coat – they pull out a moody, slower number or throw in a gorgeous chord pattern or bassline that has their own distinct stamp on it. They have art college roots – and drummer Lucy, it transpires wrote a thesis about Cabaret Voltaire – so, again, we’re in safe hands and these people know what they’re doing

    There’s something very appealing and convivial about PBE – there is a husband & wife duo at the core (Matt and Lucy), who have relocated from Devon to Sheffield and the new record which is informed by upheaval and loss – and it’s hard not to be moved by the joy emanating from the stage – they feel like one of those bands that will inspire a certain amount of loyalty (I’m thinking of Sea Power who they’ve supported) and they’re going to be a bit of a regular fixture. I’m on board!

  • Still House Plants

    Still House Plants

    This month the band are the cover stars of The Wire magazine – that extraordinarily resilient and outré music publication which, at the time of writing is still readily available in WHSmiths – if you go past the overpriced confectionery, magazines are now relegated to the back of the shop – there I see Still House Plants on a shelf, in a Railway Station branch of WHSmiths – looking very cool but strangely out of time and very much of it.

    Cut to the White Hotel, in darkest Salford – I guess the closest the North West gets to a venue like London’s Cafe Oto – where in between decadent all-nighters that start at midnight, they do put on lots of artists such as you might read about in The Wire at more sociable hours. There are 3 musicians gathering on the stage and as they start to play I’m immediately struck by telepathic interplay between them. This is very much a group. One brilliantly innovative, minimalist guitarist (cut from the same cloth as Wire’s Bruce Gilbert, John McGeoch or David Pajo perhaps), a fantastic freewheeling drummer who has a very stripped-down kit -(Robert Wyatt or Wire’s Robert Gotobed springs to mind -yeah that good) -and a singer who spends the set hunched over a mic stand facing the band but has this remarkable, husky soulful voice that rises up from nowhere and adds an unexpected emotional heft that absolutely lifts this music into somewhere stratospheric.  

    The songs aren’t conventionally structured and they veer between danceable beats and sounding like the drums are falling down stairs but it never gets tedious or overly chin-stroking – this is deeply experimental music you can dance to, or just stand back and take it all in.

    It’s an exhilarating, and hugely energising experience watching them lock in and out of each other doing their thing. It turns out I haven’t seen it all before, there is still music out that there can surprise and delight that is completely otherworldly.  I pick up a beautifully packaged CD, make my feelings known to the disarmingly charming musicians at the merch stand and walk back into the darkness of Salford. Still House Plants moved me. Let them move you.