http://ollierobbins.com/Home.html
http://www.undercutmusic.com/
http://www.councilpop.moonfruit.com/
Sometimes we are asked to read in between the lines, understand irony, or consider the bigger picture. Though our feet are firmly planted on the floor, they may lose their grip as the next wave of media hype comes crashing towards us, like the seventh wave of an incoming tide.
Tonight we were treated to three straight-up no bullshit acts who did not fail to deliver despite the impossibilities of finding, let alone playing in this tiny downstairs bar. The spacious lounge of old is still intact upstairs: in fact take a glance in through the windows and you would never guess that there was a gig happening in the little room below.
It’s there that I find THE CASINOS awaiting their slot. They sit untroubled on the stage, weighing in at a combined weight of 28 stone dead, 16 or 17 if a day, pondering the less than huge turnout.
They opened with ‘Mummy’s Boy’, and despite that little irony, the little bleeders proceeded to rip up the joint. Fresh faced Stockport lads they may well be, but with a mini-following spilling lager all over the gaff as they danced off the effects of an all day session in the Good Friday sunshine, their nervousness fed their set and gave it an edge.
Second generation punk rockers won’t shock us as much this time, but for kids that weren’t even born the first time round, the attention to detail is too precise for it to be a period study. Slowing it down with ‘Take my cares away’ they hit on a ska vibe that mirrored punk’s affiliation to dub reggae, with their weedy sound and off key guitar/vocals sounding as vital now as it would have then, when the need to put across the message overtook musical finesse.
Not that there is no talent. The rhythm section is as tight as their DIY approach needs it to be. The onstage banter was funny as they argued over the set, and when one said something in a rather refined accent, the rest let him have it in no uncertain terms for blowing their guttersnipe cover. The likeable singer chain smoked his way through the set, and the guitarist performed with his back to the stage. That is not rehearsed, that is fledgling behaviour.
Effortless drumming and a lightning fast note perfect bass gave them their sound, and despite themselves, the ‘ultra-cool’ bar staff nodded along with smiles that betrayed their ‘impress me’ veneer.
Rather hard to follow that with an acoustic guitar and a harmonica dressed in a bottle green shooting jacket and corduroy trousers, wouldn’t you say?
OLLIE ROBBINS interspersed anecdotes about the vicar in his family with twisted tales of rat-race psychosis. These dry sociological observations spilled out of short bursts of stand-up comedy and into his gentle, reflective and somewhat melancholy style. His public schoolboy demeanour and plummy voice left him wide open to hecklers but they were beaten to it by his delicately crafted songs – he has already flung this comfortable rural upbringing roughly underneath the wheels of urban life.
Compare ‘Southern Cemetery Blues’ (about the perils of customer service/telesales, a dual carriageway and a robbery) with ‘Footprints’ (about returning to the tiny Bristol village he grew up in 10years after leaving), and you’ll almost be able to hear the reflective half-blues, half-folk that tonight drew the hostility out of a small and rather difficult audience left somewhat the worse for wear as a consequence of heavy all day drinking in the Good Friday sunshine:
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“Anyone ever worked in a call centre?” he asked, striking an immediate chord with this audience. In a call centre we are all equals, all robots. The affirmative response was automatic.
Finishing with ‘Beautiful Tuesday’ this Manchester-based artist soothed away the hostility completely, fully earning the warm response he got for his trouble. Delicate, and rich in pastoral imagery, his songs are worth hearing, and he’s always gigging, so try to catch this wishful thinker soon!
Also from Bristol, UNDERCUT took the stage with the room getting hot and quickly cranked up a storm on which the hugely impressive vocals soared and dipped. This five piece outfit are in possession of a massive sound that adds up to much more than the sum of its parts to create an impressive wall of thunderous, seething rock music.
Prior to its April 24th release, ‘Doing Fine’ sounded every inch the festival anthem as did other tracks from their forthcoming album, ’96 Hours’. Three songs in, ‘America’ disintegrates into fathoms of feedback as the guitars build up a swirling seething cauldron of noise, and there’s a subtle change of pace that makes the huge tune soar. I think of the shattered peace of the upstairs bar, and smile as I’m uplifted with the music.
‘Something for the Weekend’ opens with gain-heavy distortion, and then explodes into a melancholy clarity before the chorus takes the whole thing off its hinges. Their big-hitting songs and driven cacophonies gather so much momentum so quickly that you can’t fail to be hooked by the resulting effect. They stem the flow until it pulsates during ‘Close your Eyes’, and then let it hit the ceiling to stunning effect. I can’t quite decide whether I’m being carried along or pulled in by their music, but it possesses the spirit and energy of guitar-driven rock n’ roll, one hell bent on answering its calling without a sideways glance at the competition.
‘Delight’ is another slow-builder, and then they let it flow until it grinds painfully against itself and screams in tandem with its ‘I don’t need you’ stubbornness until it spirals down, drowned in waves of appreciative noise. Undercut are destined for bigger venues just like the way their sound could fill the sky.
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