This was the early show of two at the Barfly this Easter Sunday as part of the launch of this year's Camden Rocks festival which appears to be the current name of the Camden Crawl. We got in with enough time to catch the last three songs or so from BLACK DELTA MOVEMENT who are a pretty decent Brit indie rock band.
For much of what we heard, they sounded like a cross between Echo and The Bunnymen and early Charlatans, sort of before the drugs really kicked in. It was also all about the band's guitarist who played some really good solos, but what they need to sort out is the clunky time changes as on each occasion the songs shifted into another chord or time signature they seemed to struggle momentarily. I don't know if they meant to do this or they just need to work on it.
I did feel sorry for the drummer when half his kit collapsed during the penultimate song and the sound man was as good as useless when he came and looked at the just-about-upright-once- more-drums and walked back to his desk.
They finished with Butterfly a cool, vaguely psychedelic song that somehow morphed into a verse and chorus of The End that paid homage nicely to the version recorded across the road at the Roundhouse by The Doors while sounding nothing like them or the versions I heard Nico play of the same song at Dingwalls back in the 1980's. Enjoyable stuff overall and a decent support act.
Soon enough it was time for the early show headliners RACHEL STAMP to come on and continue their current rather hectic one or two shows a year re-union schedule that will hopefully gain a bit more momentum later in the year.
Once Robin Guy had found his way to the drum stool, they opened with a full on blast of Brand New Toy and sounded every bit as good as they always have done live. It didn't matter that Will wasn't playing his Gretsch tonight; he was still a Monster Of The New Wave, while David Ryder Prangley's bass was just sounding monstrously good underpinning the guitar.
Jet Black Supersonic was about as obscure as they got all night no matter how many times Robin threatened to play The Lion Sleeps Tonight. Either way they rumbled through it like a supersonic jet taking off; Shaheena Dax's keyboards sounding like the band's thruster unit.
I Got The Worm got the full on sing along treatment and went down a storm. As the set went on, the 'tween song banter got funnier but never got in the way of a stellar version of Pop Singer with its deliciously bitchy lyrics and full on scuzzy guitar married to Robin's as ever monumentally great drumming. Still was David singing about himself on Queen Bee or was it someone else? Not sure but then he did want his Dirty Bone. Don't we all.
|
So who were they calling Creeps then? I'm not sure, but it sounded great until David's bass unplugged itself and they finished the song sans bass and vocals. Technical difficulty solved it was time to get everyone singing to I Wanna Be Your Doll: a song that still has 'Hit' written all over it, and as ever the consequences of our lives is apparent when our love is like Permanent Damage. It certainly sounded that way as the keyboards ramped up into overdrive again.
We then got treated to the one cover song of the set: a great version of The Nymphs' Sad and Damned that even saw DRP try to imitate the way Inger ran her hands up her cleavage, though thankfully DRP doesn't have enough cleavage!! Still it was a great version of a cool song.
Then as they were running out of time they played a kicking stop start version of Hey Hey Michael You're Really Fantastic that threatened once to go into Black Cherry before the last verse and chorus and then finally did go into show closer Black Cherry. It sounded great and was a brilliant way to end a short and sweet set.
Sadly, as there were five bands playing the late show they had run out of time. Had the Barfly had a better drinks selection we may have stayed for a few of them as we wanted to see The Loyalties again but couldn't be bothered to hear two more support acts without a hope in hell of being half as good as Rachel Stamp. Sometimes, you just gotta cut your losses, I guess.
|
