loudness at retro bar
Save the best for last. Which means starting at the end. In which case it was a promising start of cycling feedback and squeals from Mugstar, that somehow got less gripping as it resolved backwards into more conventional psychedelic forms – I’d prescribe more Skullflower and less Acid Mothers Temple. But like everyone they were hampered with a short set length, I’d like to see them play for a lot longer. In fact they were one of the best bands of the night and it’s pretty unjust that they played to a sparsely populated room.
They were followed by what I can only presume, by process of elimination, was Stray Dog Café. They struggled bravely with a name like an unloved Tom Waits record, conversations that were louder than the band, and by drifting too close to Ska Punk to hold my attention. Which is a little unjust – they played well, and with a lot of enthusiasm in the face of complete uninterest. I just kept hearing faint echoes of Operation Ivy, Radio 4, and Girls vs Boys, but wasn’t really in the mood. Maybe the crowd was too hip for songs and structures.
However hip the crowd were they couldn’t ever be as hip as Laymar…
Sorry, just the thought of them enrages me to the point where I have to go kick the door off its hinges. Anyway, they were easy to spot even before they came onstage. They were the three guys who’d been to the ‘I’m In A Band’ store at Affleck’s Palace and got the full package: haircuts that cost more than my shoes, boots that cost more than my haircut, clothes from ‘Rock Clobber R Us’, facial hair from Billy Childish, guyliner, and immaculately turned-out girlfriends with a selection of unlikely hats and haircuts. Jesus!
What’s that? The music? Oh, sort of ambient, sort of early ‘80s jangle stuff. A little U2, a little Echo & The Bunnymen, not very gripping. They’re probably really nice guys, in which case I’m a dick and you can ignore everything I wrote. They just irritated me, is that alright? Am I allowed emotions? Good, then shut the fuck up and let’s move on.
And finally as the night got younger Blood Moon came on and trashed our ears. The bass was even bigger and better than at Womb. Sure the bass speaker was pulsing, but anyone can make a speaker vibrate. The bass was also flexing my glasses, my eyeballs, and quite possibly the fabric of space/time – certainly time seemed to run backwards and their set seemed longer than anyone else’s. And that’s a very good thing. Despite a ridiculous stage in a corner, behind a pillar, flanked by a bar, they managed to move about plenty to change instruments, fidal with peddles, and generally look like they were having a great time. The sound was immense and highly rhythmic, even bouncing at times, massive bass, squalling high notes, and a constant rumble even when they weren’t making a sound. Plenty of creative instrument abuse by means of jamming drumsticks behind bass strings, playing a drumstick up the strings, leaning the bass against the speaker, detuning the strings, hammering the pickups, and other things I couldn’t see because the bass was bending my eyeballs and distorting my vision. I swear it almost gave me a nosebleed at one point, which would have been fucking great.
So yesterday is tomorrow, tomorrow will be today but only next week, time runs backwards, bass, distortion and feedback are your very best friends, there’s a miniature blackhole in Retro Bar left by the gravity of Blood Moon’s bass, and I am Jesus – go forth and fuck, and if your boss complains, fuck them too. Here endeth the lesson.
.
They were followed by what I can only presume, by process of elimination, was Stray Dog Café. They struggled bravely with a name like an unloved Tom Waits record, conversations that were louder than the band, and by drifting too close to Ska Punk to hold my attention. Which is a little unjust – they played well, and with a lot of enthusiasm in the face of complete uninterest. I just kept hearing faint echoes of Operation Ivy, Radio 4, and Girls vs Boys, but wasn’t really in the mood. Maybe the crowd was too hip for songs and structures.
However hip the crowd were they couldn’t ever be as hip as Laymar…
Sorry, just the thought of them enrages me to the point where I have to go kick the door off its hinges. Anyway, they were easy to spot even before they came onstage. They were the three guys who’d been to the ‘I’m In A Band’ store at Affleck’s Palace and got the full package: haircuts that cost more than my shoes, boots that cost more than my haircut, clothes from ‘Rock Clobber R Us’, facial hair from Billy Childish, guyliner, and immaculately turned-out girlfriends with a selection of unlikely hats and haircuts. Jesus!
What’s that? The music? Oh, sort of ambient, sort of early ‘80s jangle stuff. A little U2, a little Echo & The Bunnymen, not very gripping. They’re probably really nice guys, in which case I’m a dick and you can ignore everything I wrote. They just irritated me, is that alright? Am I allowed emotions? Good, then shut the fuck up and let’s move on.
And finally as the night got younger Blood Moon came on and trashed our ears. The bass was even bigger and better than at Womb. Sure the bass speaker was pulsing, but anyone can make a speaker vibrate. The bass was also flexing my glasses, my eyeballs, and quite possibly the fabric of space/time – certainly time seemed to run backwards and their set seemed longer than anyone else’s. And that’s a very good thing. Despite a ridiculous stage in a corner, behind a pillar, flanked by a bar, they managed to move about plenty to change instruments, fidal with peddles, and generally look like they were having a great time. The sound was immense and highly rhythmic, even bouncing at times, massive bass, squalling high notes, and a constant rumble even when they weren’t making a sound. Plenty of creative instrument abuse by means of jamming drumsticks behind bass strings, playing a drumstick up the strings, leaning the bass against the speaker, detuning the strings, hammering the pickups, and other things I couldn’t see because the bass was bending my eyeballs and distorting my vision. I swear it almost gave me a nosebleed at one point, which would have been fucking great.
So yesterday is tomorrow, tomorrow will be today but only next week, time runs backwards, bass, distortion and feedback are your very best friends, there’s a miniature blackhole in Retro Bar left by the gravity of Blood Moon’s bass, and I am Jesus – go forth and fuck, and if your boss complains, fuck them too. Here endeth the lesson.
.
Comments
And hell, who doesn't like The Fall?
They {Laymar} were easy to spot ....they were three guys who'd been to the "I'm in a band" store at Afflecks Palace.
Sorry, I've just read that three or four times, and the rest, and it's so wide of the mark it's pathetic. I pissed my self laughing but then I realised you're not trying to be funny. Because you didn't like Laymar's music you made a personal attack on them. By your own admission you don't know them and yet you had a go at them. Of all the bands that I've seen around Manchester and beyond Laymar are probably the least hip, cool or whatever. Expensive boots! Expensive hair cuts! Absolute rubbish. Boy what a dick you are.
Like you said yourself - move on.
Anyway. So yeah, I was judging by the look and the sound, both of which put me off.
And I'm a dick for saying I don't like a group because I don't know them ... but it's okay for you to call me a dick and ... sorry who are you exactly?
This, children, is why we check the mirrors before pulling out.
You don't like Laymar's music and you don't like the way they look - that's OK. They've faced that sort of attitude for years and I would guess if they read this they would just shrug their shoulders and say you are entitled to your opinion. But is everyone suppose to look just the way YOU want them to? You would probably say No - at least I hope you would. If you knew the slightest thing about the band - and quite clearly you don't know anything at all - or had bothered to even do the slightest bit of research on them - you wouldn't have made those personal comments. They don't go in for expensive haircuts (What the fuck was you looking at when you said that), they don't go in for expensive shoes/boots (again what the fuck) and their on stage equipment is practically falling apart. Dear me!
You had a chance to retract your stupid statement and you didn't. You are an even bigger dick that I first thought!
Who am I. My name is Max. I don't have a blogg so I had to log in anonymously.
It wasn't my intention to offend, or to claim that I knew anything about the band, but rather to give an impression of how I found the gig. Of course that's coloured by my opinions, and my musical taste.
As I've made clear in other reviews, I'd rather people go and check out the work in question for themselves and make up their own minds than trust to my subjective take on things.
Mugstar have been favourites of mine for a few years now and I've seen Blood Moon only about three times (although Graham and Magenta Ray are not favourites of mine). But you used your blog to make a personal attack on three quite ordinary and nice blokes from Hulme, Levenshulme and Openshaw - who I happen to know - who didn't just go along to Afflecks and buy their image or buy expensive shoes or hairstyles. That's just not their style.
Like I said it doesn't matter that you don't like their music (and if you found Swords 'ambient sort of early 80s jangle stuff' then I would suggest you give it another listen (in fact read the reviews there are plenty of them on Google).
It was the personal attack I didn't like and having said that I apologise for the 'personal' on you.
Max
As it happens I don't hate the music of anyone who played that night, some of it just left me underwhelmed.
The comments on the appearance of Laymar were impressionistic, like the rest of the piece. It's a bugbear of mine that musicians, poets and other artists often seem to put a lot of weight on external signifiers, which tend to give an 'off the shelf' appearance. I'm perfectly happy to accept that I may have been wrong here.
But be aware that the review is, as I said, impressionistic, and tells a story. Hence the conceit of reviewing it from end to beginning.