rate the last gig you went to

The Waeve at the Lexington on Friday. A new project featuring Graham Coxon & Rose Elinor Dougall (former Pipette). Was pretty good, they did a really short set, 9 tunes in 45 minutes but I liked what I heard. Had the singer from Electric Soft Parade on drums + Coxon played some SAX on a few tunes. Confident the inevitable album will be good whenever it comes.
Support came from Clementine March, solo set with electric guitar, was nice enough, did a cover of And Your Bird Can Sing and was joined on vocals by Dana Gavanski for a song.

Decent night, ended really early too.

‘Ended really early’ isn’t a rating out of 10 you ponce

Where's your spiritualized review rocks man!

Spiritualized @ SWG3

The best big I’ve been to since covid ended the world. My enthusiasm for the show dipped a bit when Karl messaged me to say J Spaceman now performs sitting down and the band were largely playing songs from the two most recent albums. I’ve seen them before and in my experience they could be hit or miss.

Thankfully, imo, the two most recent albums are decent and Sad Jason picked several other absolute belters to perform on the night. They opened with a truly incredible version of Hey Jane, which was like a gig in its own right, the original song taken and given the full Spiritualized live treatment. I was thinking they couldn’t top it when they then performed Shine A Light - the oldest song of the night - and it was even better.

Sad Jason might look very frail but he can still bring together a brilliant live band. The dynamics of the show were wild - eight minute songs seamlessly blending into each other for two hours, moments of just J singing on his own to full on noise rock.

Almost every other touring band that’s of the same generation as Spaceman is just a nostalgia act these days. He could easily just do the rounds playing a Ladies & Gentlemen… snooze fest. Thank god he doesn’t. A really exceptional show. 9.

total stone roses supported by the smiths presumably and oaysis at norwich waterfront tonight.

its been about 20 years since i last saw a tribute act but this night was ridiculously good fun. total stone roses is actually the band afflecks palace and theyre real good. smiths presumably blew me away too while the oasis act were just ok or maybe i wasnt pissed enough at that point. i'll definitely be heading to more of these kind of nights now though, great fun and top atmosphere/crowd.

Larkin Poe - if only they had songs

Saw THE CHILDREN OF THE POPE & DOG the other week in some shithole with no stage. Love the latest songs by both, total bangers. Both bands were good even if the sound wasn't great.

Real sad to hear about Grandmaster Gareth, sucks to think I'll never see Misty's live again. Had so many wonderful times seeing them.

Yeah I had the opposite experience the other weekend. Rocked up at top Glasgow city centre venue Stereo at 8pm - where the curfew for gigs is usually 10pm - and discovered the band weren’t on until midnight. Luckily I’m still mad fer it - unlike Old Man Mahoney - and I just hit a nearby boozer for three hours.

Sweaty Palms are a great Glasgow band who started out really in debt to the Amazing Snakeheads and Fat White Family but have gradually evolved to become something a lot heavier and weirder. They’re doing almost a late-80s Cure thing now. An enjoyable gig and a solid 7!

Couple of shows in the last few weeks:

Joel Plaskett Emergency w. TUNS - I had purchaed a ticket to see TUNS (a canadian/Halifax 'supergroup' (coughs) featuring members of Sloan, the inbreds and the flashing lights) back in the fall, and it was postponed when omicron hit. Unfortunately it was postponed to the same day as another Halifax pop veteran, Joel Plaskett, who I also had a ticket for. So from what I gather, Chris Murphy called Joel up and said 'why don't we just open for you?' Fine by me. TUNS came out and blasted through a dozen or so songs in 30 minutes and were off, a total delight, but would have preferred a full set. JPE were also great, apparently one of (or entirely) their first show since the pandemic, and they were having a ball. 2 hours of power pop and hard rocking east coast fun times. Can't beat it. 8/10

Sarah Harmer - Drove up to my (and her adpoted) hometown of Kingston to see her for the first time in at least 10 years, probably more. Always loved her music, and her new album is one of my favourites of the pandemic era. She played most of the new album, brought the 'hits' (such as they are) and even threw in a weeping tile song at the end. Loved it. 8.5/10

(I'm aware no one outside of Canada probably has the faintest idea who any of those people are. Don't care.)

Up next: McCartney.

Yard Act at Norwich Arts Centre tonight.

I ended up being a bit disappointed by the album (still great though). This was my third time seeing them but the first since the album has been out. It was fucking brilliant tbh. Sound was one of the best sounds I've ever heard at a gig. Crowd was pumped and up for it and the band really bounces off them too. I knew they were great live but it's really caught me by surprise how much I loved this. Seeing them again tomorrow afternoon too. 10/10

Kim Gordon at Koko last week. Excellent set. Enjoyed her solo record from the other year a fair bit and I think it worked even better live. A lot of variety in the set, she's still a total fucking badass. An Irish band called Pretty Happy supported, I've never wanted to jump on stage and assault a band so much in my life. In all my years of going to gigs they've got to be up there as one of the biggest cunts I've ever seen. Fuck I'm so angry now even thinking about them that I can't write about the wonderful Wide Awake Festival from Saturday.

You never saw The Wynd live then?

wide awake festival in brockwell park saturday

met up for a couple of beers with popular forum members krburg and columbia rocks man aka christmas miracle early doors. kevin is a fanny and didn't go to the festival so me and rocks man headed over and met up with karl, helen and jamesdcody. it was a bit of a slow start music wise so instead i stalked the fella from yard act and we caught a bit of nations of language who were bang average. decided to hit the main stage instead and saw fatoumata diawara who was good fun. i thought it was a group but turns out its a solo project.

business really picked up here with yard act who smashed it again. got right on the barrier for these and loved it just as much as the night before. i'm right back into them again and can see myself doing a bit of a u-turn on the album. what a band. fat white family were next and tbh bored me a little. yeah they bring some danger and dress funny and have unpredictable stage antics but it all wears thin after a while when you don't have any tunes. they also blew the PA system which meant a crackly sound on the mainstage for the rest of the day.

caught the last half of billy nomates next who sounded pretty good despite being one of the worst people on twitter since geoff barrow. went for a piss and beer and caught a few songs of tropical fuck storm who were playing a later slot than billed due to the stage not being built in time

back in the tent for the horrors who i was apprehensive about due to the new songs being shit. they came on really late so only had a short set which basically consisted of two new songs that were awful industrial goth shit but then they got out the hits with still life, sea within a sea and something to remember me by, the latter of which was one of my moments of the day. proper new order style anthem.

main stage again for amyl and the sniffers whose set i'm a bit hazy about as was pretty pissed by then. they're fun but all the songs sound the same and i kinda lose interest quickly.

primal scream headlined doing screamadelica and were perfect for the mood i was in. a great big singalong to some of my favourite tunes. they're still not as good live as when they had extra guitars but the gospel singers and bagpipes were a nice touch. unfortunately my good friend karl mahoney was seriously injured during a crowdsurfing attempt during rocks which soured the occassion.

overall the lineup bands wise wasn't as strong as last year but it was nice to have a proper big headliner and the lineup personnel wise was certainly stronger swapping rod and krburg for chrissie and jamesdcody. hopefully the festival continues to book lineups of this type and keeps tickets cheap as its an event i'd like to keep coming back to.

Julien Baker - Theater seated kinda thing on a Monday night. Not the biggest fan but I feel its nearly mandatory to go see these kind of artists when they come to town. And I didn't regret it tbh, sound was spot on and her voice was astonishing all the time.

Tell us more about Karl's cringe worthy stagedive? Did he land on his mailbag? 

We got him up after a struggle (he eats a lot of biscuits). He then kicked Chrissie in the head which caused him to drop Karl. Karl now has a bad back.