nme tour - portsmouth mini review
arrived at venue to find our seats nicely set up for a front row view, 5 mins before the mystery jets took the stage. although you could have been confused as the repeated refrain 'zootime' sounded a lot like 'zutons'.... anyways the young kids took one side of the stage while dad took up the other side. started off with zootime and turned it into a prog rock version of black flag's 'the process of weeding out'... before hitting into the singles. nice touch. 'you can do anything thing you want as long as it makes sense' - interesting take on the world. really liked them, will probably pick up the album.
after a 20 min pause in the proceedings, time for some heads down rock action courtesy of the we are scientists gents. it kinda reminded me of placebo in places although the bass players 'cock' glasses and quality tash looked like they came from a doc sausage and the blowoffs benefit gig. they talked a lot of silly surreal talk and rocked some more. again, enjoyable enough.
so onto the third band.... arctic monkeys. thank god. they were nominated for a Brit Award and as the winners, could have turned round and said 'sorry portsmouth, we're off to get our award enjoy the other 3 bands'. but they didn't so fair play to them for that.
Having a decent viewpoint and the burning questions of the forkers board to answer, i decided to try and work out the appeal of the band first. looking around, the seats were half empty but remembering that we used to get 8-10 people with seating tickets downstairs on a regular basis with the old '4 in, 1 out, 3 more in' method, i peeked down below to see a ram packed dancefloor. yup, that's where the rest of the seated ticket holders were. audience - bit of a mix, lots of 14-20, plenty of 20-30, a few 30-40 and several 40+.
stage entrance - wander on, well more amble on, nothing fancy here. finish smoking, grab instruments, tell the crowd in a low key manner that the award's been won in the same way you might say to someone 'fancy a pint' as you're strolling up to the bar.
stage presence - to be honest, not a lot. bass player didn't move much, guitarist looked like he was concentrating hard on his guitar, drummer - well ok didn't expect a lot of movement there but there was no big presence to him. singer / guitarist - seemed almost insular, didn't talk a lot to the crowd and when he did it was very quiet. again, more of a low key banter. then again, what would you expect from a young band who have hit the big time at such an early age? give them some more time / experience and perhaps the pressure valve (understate anything so you don't appear cocky) might release itself a bit to allow some confidence to come through.
songs - watch this clip first:
http://s6.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=1N2OC ... A7JORAOBXG
shot with the phone video cam so not high quality but i'd comment:
a) every fucker there was singing (except me cos i'm diligently recording it liks) along to it. last time i saw that was at finsbury park in 96 when a bunch of old punk rockers took to the stage and started playing 'bodies'.
b) the whole of the crowd below went off on one, looked more like a pit at a hardcore show. (justin - can you get the circle pit going next time)
c) if anyone texts me when i'm taking a video clip then the whole thing disappears.... bugger, no fake tales of san francisco to share.
As far as the music goes, there was more good than bad (i prefer the faster numbers when they go for it and rock out). there was a lot of space in the music compared to a lot of bands and plenty that stuck in the mind.
perhaps that's the appeal - a band who relate to their audience because they are the boys next door, in the club, pub, park etc. not someone who's talking down to you but someone who's likely to be down the front bouncing around to the next band on etc. nearest thing i've seen to oasis for a while from that point of view.
as for that review - cleverly written but lacking one essential element that was so evident on Wednesday - passion. watching the kids coming out after that show (a good proportion left without staying for the headliners, Maximo Park), you could see it in their eyes, their expressions, the jumps for joy as they met their friends outside. fork jaded hacks with their 'date rape indie' bollocks . fork the nme with their hysterical fill every page with more monkeys than last week diatribe. i hope this band gets a chance to grow and develop.
but what i would say is that a large part of their success is their large amount of teenage fans that feel 'connected' or whatever 