2 posts tagged “cockpit”
Raven-haired, eyes closed, jaw working. Mark Lanegan takes the no nonsense approach to extremes. There’s no interaction with the crowd. No introducing his band (including Nick Oliveri on rhythm). A rock star whose needs and musts list is confined to a few towels and sixty cigarettes. Predictably, there’s little movement from him throughout the gig.
He shifts into his default position (tattooed hand surgically attached to the mic stand) as the band open with the simple heaviness of Sideways in Reverse. It sets the tone. All the songs tonight sound harder than the album tracks.
It’s a blurry start that drowns out the main reason people are there. But his voice soon warms. Four songs in and Lanegan finds sufficient gravel to make One Way Street, his world-weary ode to life, a highlight of the night (‘Oh the deafening roar remember that’s called a one way street/and you can’t get down without crying’). The knowing fatalism of When Your Number Isn’t Up (‘I stay close to this frozen border/So close I can hit it with a stone’) follows and it’s clear that Lanegan’s new material – unaided by song writing partners – achieves the greatest clarity of his solo career.
Hit the City doesn’t suffer from Polly Jane’s absence. A delicate version of I’ll Take Care of You is enhanced by sporadic messy licks provides a welcome reprieve to the wall of noise. But in general, the subtle discordance on ‘Bubblegum’ (2004) is dropped in favour of crazed, swirling guitar noise. An extended version of Gospel Plough in the encore provides the only Screaming Trees tune. Lanegan disappears leaving his band to jam. Nobody seriously expects him to return.
His songs of loss and intoxication bring in the ‘discerning’ rock fans (i.e. male, slightly depressed, not young). The lack of gimmickry reduces the Strokes wannabe count.
A genuinely melancholy rock idol and he’s loved for it. But is it a happy tour bus?
Some
of these Swedish chaps do a great job of sounding American. Lead singer Nicke
Borg sounds like Brett Michael's filtered through a TV evangelist's voice box.
With all that public transport running on time being Swedish can't do much for your punk credentials. Still our chums up north produce some decent bands. Even some without death make up.
Borg's rock patter stretches credulity when he boasts he's never been to school. Strange assertion given that they formed the band while they were at school. But then the Backyard Babies slavishly tow the bad boy rock line even if that means a few porky pies. They look distinctive enough to get away with it. Most notably, drummer Peder Carlsson's resplendently bushy lamb chops.
A few words work wonders on this
crowd. Fifteen minutes in guitarist Dregan asks 'You guys wanna hear a
heavy one?' Where was the light one? What he actually means is a
slow, heavy one that proved to be the only variation in pace of the
evening. For the most part it's supercharged punk all the way. The
band aren't fatigued by the being at the back-end of a European
tour. Songs like Making Enemies is Good and Powderhead provide musical
high points as well as laying down their punk with lipstick attitude.
They've been compared to Guns n
Roses and Motley Crue. True, in terms of the look, their music opts for
straight ahead punk beats rather than sleazy groove. Anyone with affection
for that era will think they look hip. There are the tattoos of
course. Borg is blessed with that gift to the few: looking cool in a
bandana.
The skull and cross bones drape used as the backdrop presents the biggest challenge to the bands credibility. With all the aged rock imagery on stage it's difficult to take it seriously. But when a more marketable 'modern' or nu-metal approach is the answer, they may as well carry on as they are.
