Guillemots @ The Octagon, Sheffield

Possibly the best concert experience I've ever had.

My sister and I had just stepped out of the hotel and were walking towards the venue when in the distance, 20 metres away, I recognised someone who was walking towards us. As she got closer I realised it was Arista and that Magrão, Greig and a few roadies were following a few metres behind. After they'd passed us, me and my sister stopped and turned around to see them walking into a restaurant just opposite our hotel.

After a failed attempt at snapping a photo of the restaurant window from outside, my sister convinced me that I was a wimp and would be missing out on meeting one of my favourite bands if I didn't go in.. so I did. After apologising for disturbing their meal, we got a photo with them, left the restaurant, went around the corner and squealed a bit.


Two hours later...
On the way into the concert Magrão stopped me and my sister, much to our surprise/delight, and handed us VIP passes.

The concert itself was fantastic. They played a lot of crowd favourites such as 'Made-Up Lovesong #43', 'Annie, Let's Not Wait' and 'Trains to Brazil' as well as less popular EP tracks like 'She's Evil' (where Magrão takes centre stage), 'The Dormouse and the Meerkat' (a b-side rarely played live) and four new songs. Fyfe also played a memorable solo acoustic version of 'We're Here'.

After asking the "Golden Ticket" holders to come backstage, they band proceeded into their final song, 'São Paulo'. We were given labcoats and then, during the final half of the song, we were led onstage by a roadie and told to hit a large metal bird with the drum sticks we'd been given. We happily obliged. When the song ended we were led backstage to have a few beers with the band and the rest.. well, that's saved for the deep inner faults of my mind (and possibly my livejournal..).

The morals of this entry.. stalk your favourite bands, always accept VIP passes (apparently they have a lot of trouble finding people to accept them!!) and.. look out for members of Guillemots before the show if you ever go and see them.




Photographs courtesy of my sister.

Regina Spektor @ The Astoria

The pleasingly central location in London of the Astoria was the setting for one of the many NME-branded Award Shows, showcasing a diverse range of headliners and a larger than normal set of support acts. First up to support Regina Spektor was Only Son, an unintelligible New Yorker who gained nothing from the sound setup in the venue. Using an iPod as his backing band, he strummed his way through a series of unremarkable yet fairly pleasant songs. He ended his set with a bizarre 'acceptance speech' for nothing in particular which no one could understand.

Next on stage were Brinkman, a three piece London band playing fairly standard Britpop, but an enjoyable performance with the standout track being the heartfelt A Real Thunderbolt which has been a favourite of mine for a few weeks. Sweden's Love Is All were the third support band, and they were very Swedish indeed. Punky, energetic indie pop with a shouty female singer and enthusiastic saxophonist who refused to allow Regina Spektor's grand piano, taking over much of the stage, stop him from pogoing about as much as possible.

After more music over the PA from a DJ with a Radiohead fixation (5 tracks were counted through the course of the evening), Regina Spektor made her way onstage and delivered a stunning unaccompanied Ain't No Cover and from then onwards she had the crowd transfixed. The majority of her set came from her two most recent albums Soviet Kitsch and 2006's Begin to Hope. She also played fan favourites such as Bobbing for Apples and Baby Jesus.

For the second half of the set, Regina was accompanied by a band, unlike her most recent visit to the UK. Songs like Carbon Monoxide and Better were reproduced far closer to their recorded counterparts than had previously been seen at Regina's shows.

Regina was amazing, showing off her vast range of vocal talents as well as piano and the odd bit of guitar. Her personality shone through the songs; no other performer could ever get away with covering her. A truly captivating, brilliant gig.

Patrick Wolf @ The Junction 2

February 2007 has possibly been the best month I have ever experienced gig wise. I've played my first proper gig as well as going to see the likes of The Decemberists. With Regina Spektor to come this evening and The Shins later in the month you'd be forgiven for forgetting about Patrick Wolf and his relatively lowly levels of stardom. On the basis of this performance, ignoring him would be a great sin against the world.

He played in a small theatre type venue in Cambridge known as the Junction 2. At only 300 capacity the gig couldn't be described as anything but highly intimate. The gig began with the weirdest/scariest support act I have ever seen in my life; "No Bra" (literally). No Bra is a 6ft naked she-male (complete with moustache), mumbling her depraved insanities over simplistic techno. Personally I found it both hilarious and scary in equal measures. Yes, if she'd taken one step forward I would have taken two back, but at the same time when she moved onto another purely shocking topic it still raised humoured eye brows.

After an inordinately long wait Patrick Wolf entered the stage to face a crowd that had started to grow increasingly impatient. His stage presence and charisma was magnificent; I'd been expecting a slightly over-theatrical kid, but instead he paraded the stage with elegance. Playing through a good selection of songs from his two released albums, and new effort The Magic Position, everything sounded perfect other than, strangely, the ukulele, which sounded horribly tinny and scratchy - like the strings were far too tight or something.

Highlights for me were my new favourite The Stars and emphatic closer The Magic Position.

Arcade Fire Vs The Decemberists

After having so much to do recently my review of seeing Arcade Fire live late last month got pushed back and back. All the way until past me seeing The Decemberists a week ago today. So now instead of writing about both the events separately, I'm going to face them off against each other in a North American, Canada vs USA, fight to the death.

The first of the two gigs took place in St John's Church, Westminster. The church's large stage is normally put to use for orchestras but took a break from it's classical background to welcome Canada's finest, Arcade Fire. In fact they seemed slightly out of ease with the run of three concerts, not even publishing them in their official listings for the month.

The band ran through 10 of the 11 songs from their new album, the aptly titled (for the surroundings) Neon Bible. To my vast disappointment only a couple of songs from the band's debut, Funeral were bellowed around the church. A couple more songs really wouldn't have gone amiss, as without a support act, and a set length of only 1 hour 15 minutes did make the gig seem a little short (especially considering all the traveling I had done that day to get there).

The performance of course though was outstanding, with up to 10 members on-stage at once, all singing at the top of their voices whilst playing a powerful mix of unusual and not-so-unusual instruments. Everything sounded perfect, acting as a real compliment to the acoustics of the church. The talk-about moment of course had to be the unexpected acoustic, mid-crowd, performance of The Clash's Gun's of Brixton which opened the gig. Megaphones, a double-bass, and a mandolin, made this a very different kind of cover. The picture above (taken by me of course :P) is of Win standing on a chair in the middle of the crowd mid-song.

Eight days later The Decemberists took the stage at the far more normal venue of Shepherd's Bush Empire. To begin they played absolutely breathtaking performances of The Crane Wife and Island, Come and See, The Landlord's Daughter, You'll not Feel the Drowning. Performances which I would have been very happy with as highlights of the evening, only they were not; there was not a single song The Decemberists performed that didn't have me spellbound. They performed songs from all of their albums giving the crowd, in my opinion, almost exactly what they wanted (of course if the crowd had been just me, the crowd wouldn't have been so happy with the lack of The Gymnast, High Above the Ground).

The showmanship of The Decemberists almost stood out even more than the songs themselves. They got the crowd participating in a surprisingly large range of activities. Front man Colin Meloy started these proceedings with a bout of "mid-show calisthenics" and this was followed by the old splitting the crowd into several large choirs to sing in 16 Military Wives. Whilst we've all been in a crowd doing this kind of thing before, it really worked here, and I enjoyed it far more than I'd ever expect to. A devastatingly good rendition of Sons and Daughters climaxed with the whole crowd smiling wholeheartedly whilst bellowing out "Hear all the bombs, they fade away" with their exhausted voices. Several crowd members even got to go on stage and bounce around with Colin Meloy, who was obviously enjoying himself, which is always nice to see.

The fun continued right through into the two encores with guest appearances from Robyn Hitchcock and Mike Scott (who are a little unknown to someone my age, but evidently from the reaction of the crowd, not to everyone else). They finished the evening with a highly unexpected reenactment of part of the American civil war during A Cautionary Song, where the crowd were split down the middle so we could scowl at each other from the opposite sides of the battle.

Whilst both gigs won't be forgotten by any of there attendees easily. Arcade Fire were forced into retreat by the sheer amount of smiling The Decemberists caused. It wasn't the songs that put Decemberists far and above on top for me, but instead the showmanship; those little extras that showed the crowd that the band really cared about making sure their fans have a good time. All other bands should take note and follow The Decemberists' example.

Margot and The Nuclear So and So's

Nearly a month after I wrote 90% of this post I'm going to bring it to you. Damn I hate the exam seasons. Anyway late but still intact... enjoy.

Margot and the Nuclear So and So's are a musical collective with a really silly name from Indianapolis. Their first album, Dust Of Retreat, was released in the first couple of months of last year, but as normally I have stayed firmly behind the times and so I bring it to you now.

Their music is mostly pretty folky and possibly a bit too nice for a lot of tastes, very easy to like and get into. The album is pretty consistently catchy, with, for me a couple of stand out tracks.

The obvious choice is Skeleton Key, but it has been writen about all over the place (A quick search of the hype machine will show you a load of results). Instead I am going to write about the much more unassuming Jen Is Bringin' The Drugs.

Jen Is Bringin' The Drugs brings you Margot and the Nuclear So and So's in their most stripped down form. A good track in the acoustic guitar + vocals tradition it has everything it should. A catchy, sing-along melody and interesting lyrics pen this track as one of my favourites of the moment. Some of the lyrics are brilliantly witty in my opinion, yet constantly stark and a tad depressive:

And Jen don't wanna be seen,
But I saw her in a swank magazine.
She had an airbrushed face,
But the lines of distaste
were crossed without crossing of legs.

Buy:
The Dust Of Retreat (via Amazon)

Listen:
Jen Is Bringin' The Drugs (via Sendspace)
Skeleton Key (via Sendspace)

Links:
Myspace
margotandthenuclearsoandsos.com

Errors

Errors are a band I have recently discovered from that hotbed of musical genius, Glasgow. However, unlike the typical indie pop or post-punk bands the city has historically produced, Errors make electronica, with comparisons being drawn, amongst others, to their fellow countrymen Boards of Canada. Their spectacularly titled debut EP How Clean Is Your Acid House? is a great collection on repeat on my iPod, taking obvious influences from the typical electronica staples like Four Tet and Squarepusher, as well as seemingly some post-rock: indeed, they're signed to Mogwai's own label, Rock Action Records and have supported them on tour, as well as eclecticly supporting Sons and Daughters and Explosions in the Sky.

Mr Milk, the opening track, is brilliantly catchy and builds up into a multi-layered mishmash of bleeps, beats and buzzes that somehow works and is even, dare I say it, danceable. Terror Tricks and Crew Cut have indistinguishable computerised vocals beneath the fits and starts of drumbeats, fuzzy guitar, addictive basslines and, err, more computer noises. Last track Songos Ya Mongos! even has a riff recognisable as a guitar! Praise from the critics is reverberating around the Clyde for this lot; they're certainly promising.

Buy:
How Clean Is Your Acid House? (via Rock Action Records)

Listen:
Mr Milk
Crew Cut
Songos Ya Mongos!

Links:
weareerrors.com
Myspace

Chris Garneau

Looks like Yoni Wolf and sounds like Sufjan Stevens.

I've found a description of Chris Garneau's music which perfectly summarises my thoughts, so I will borrow a few words from (Chris Garneau@last.fm) to start off with:

"Beautiful and sad music... balanced on the edge of melancholy and hopefulness. For quiet evenings and pure mornings. Piano, cello, haunting and graduating melodies, beautiful airy vocals."

Garneau creates delicate pop songs that are infused with elements of jazz. They often only consist of piano and vocal parts, but Garneau is not afraid to use his voice in a way reminiscent of Regina Spektor to create diverse sounds, textures and emotions. This might not be coincidence, as it is obvious that he is a fan from a list of his "favorite enemies" on his myspace site. The third track on the album, 'Black & Blue', even shares a short piano part with Spektor's 'Samson'.

Garneau reminds me a lot of Sufjan Stevens; his songwriting, vocal technique, his delicate and relaxing melodies with Moldy-Peaches-esque charm. The fact that every song is good enough to deserve its place on the record reminds me a lot of Damien Rice's 'O'.

" I'm always going to worry about this, but you'll tell me 'It's okay, Chris' "

His originality can be easily heard on the final track of the album, 'Between The Bars', originally written and recorded by Elliott Smith (found on his album 'Either/Or'). Personally, I'm not a fan of covers on albums, but Garneau makes this song his own, and for a listener who had not heard the original, this song would not be out of place on this record. The vast amount of emotion on this track can mainly be creditted to Garneau's vocal part, which I think is one of his best on the entire record.

Thanks to Xiu Xiu's Jamie Stewart and his recommendation to the record company Absolutely Kosher, Chris Garneau's debut album, 'Music For Tourists', will be released into shops later this month. It is, however, available for preorder and shipping from the Absolutely Kosher site.


Listen:
Relief (sendspace)
Baby's Romance (sendspace)
Between The Bars (sendspace)