I'd heard some good things about Triggerfinger, so when I was offered the chance to go see them I took it and am glad that I did.
I got into a fairly busy Garage in time to see all of THE HUMAN FLY'S set, though to be honest two songs would have been more than enough of this Leeds-based outfit's set. They seem to want to be prog rock but without the immense drug intake to do it properly, which means that we get lengthy prog funk workouts with minimal lyrics which is itself a small mercy as the singer is trying to sound like a cross between Thom Yorke and Tom Morris of Her Name Is Calla but without the substance or subtlety of either of those.
So having songs that sound like a proggier Radiohead wasn't really helping them but it was still better than the 70's boogie prog number they played. That was really appalling and had several people wincing at some of the playing and the lyrics. They finished with an over-long space prog jam that sounded like the worst end of the Pat Metheny group's fusion confusion pieces. I really hope I don't have to suffer the Human Fly again anytime soon.
Thankfully it didn't take long to erase the them from memory as I was too busy being intrigued by TRIGGERFINGER'S set up as they moved the drum riser forwards so that the drummer would be level with the guitarist and bass guitarist standing and playing either side of him. The bassist also had a rack for all his basses, This, and a reputation as the loudest band in Antwerp had me all fired up to hear them.
They didn't disappoint. All three of them were dressed in sharp suits with Mario the drummer sporting a Union Jack jacket with white trousers and he more than lived up to the promise of his drums positioning as he is a truly entertaining skinsman to watch, no wonder he was recently voted Belgium's best drummer!
From the opening blasts of I'm Coming For you it was clear they were fully fuelled up for a rip roaring set of High Octane rock that reminded me of the record Heavy Trash made with Powersolo.
The singer certainly has some of Jon Spencer's braggadocio and even if he's On my Knees you'd never know it from the passionate delivery of the words as the bass player rips into his lines and Mario...well Mario entertains and plays with a grin like he is on one of those sixties TV clips of Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Tich.
I think it was before they sang Cherry that Ruben asked if there was anyone here from Holland, France or Belgium or Poland and got big cheers for all of them!! This confirmed what I suspected, that I was a rare local in this audience, most of whom had travelled some distance for a good dose of Triggerfinger. Cherry which had a great breakdown and quiet bit in the middle that the band held for quite some time before everything came crashing back in.
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They introduced Let It Ride as being a riding song and it sounded a lot like Peer Gunt meeting Orange Goblin and seeing who had the fastest hog played at a frantic pace that got everyone going. All Night Long had some really good interaction between Mario and Paul on the bass as they made sure we all got nice and sweaty as they went on all night long.
They thanked their new label, Dramatic, for the forthcoming re-issue of All this Dancin' Around before making most of the room dance along to it. Lots of people were singing along by this point and Feed Me also kept up the pace and got the crowd singing going nicely.
Then Ruben announced it was time for Mario to take over for his solo, well this was one hell of an hyperactive drum solo. It came in four distinct parts and never ceased to be entertaining or captivating, damn can Mario play those drums! I think it was the third or fourth part that contained some minimal vocal shouts of "Hey hey!" which, when the rest of the band came back out, was followed by some screaming. Not sure what the song they closed with was, but its lyrics were about trying to keep us straight and this set was anything but that.
They came back for an encore and opened it with a mass sing a long version of Lykke Li's I Follow Rivers which was by far the quietest thing they played all night. In its slipstream, Mario switched from his drum kit to play a beer glass with two knives for what I put down as One More but is probably called something else. But who cares? It was a inventive way to close a mighty good set.
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