Thursday, October 28, 2004
Halloween Gimp
Well, well, well - 3 holes in the ground. Last night at the Fez was much more of a Hallowe'en experience than I had been anticipating, what with some scary looking types wandering around, girls dressed up in costumes and the dread-filled horror of having to turn up to work after a night on bottles of Castlemaine XXXX… I, as ever, thought it would be appropriate to turn up about half-way through proceedings (I was wrong again!) and managed to wander into the main room just after British Beef had started playing.
With a name like that, they should be an entourage of strippers, a wrestling tag-team, the UK's representative at the UN complaints committee or a brand/flavour of soup. What they definitely should NOT be is a three chord punk band. Not with that name, anyway. British 182 or Beef Charlotte (Beef Shalottes? Sounds tasty, eh?) would be better. To give them their due, they had all the brash confidence of a band who had been signed by Sony and were probably going to be force-fed down the ears and eyes of every grumpy, hoody-wearing teenager from Newcastle to Newquay. They made jokes about "pot", swore occasionally and wore t-shirts that made them look like they knew what they were doing (although how you can wear Ramones and Metallica tees and STILL produce the aural equivalent of dysentry I will never know. Sony probably hired a camp Italian stylist to polish their image).
The crowd called out for "Year 3000" in between songs, which almost provoked a reaction from the band (besides making even more bad noise), but Busted would have been popular, teacher's pet, apple-polishing do-gooders at school, and British Beef would have been the disenfranchised, surly and disgruntled mob sitting at the back of the class trying to stencil band logos onto their pencil cases.
Ah, at least they had a few solo's in their tunes. They weren't very good, but they were played pretty well.
Then, after they had slunk off to consider a career as professional band-wagon chasers, the stage was clear for Reading's top light-entertainers Three Litre to take charge and try and salvage what was left of the crowd after British Beef had sent them scattering elsewhere. The black arm bands on display were for John Peel, as we soon found out. Graham announced that in honour of his passing his merry band of troubadours expected everyone in attendance to cough up and pay their respects by observing a one-minute's noise (very apt, and hugely respected by the crowd). Cue crashing, thrashing, screaming and wailing from the Litre while the crowd whistled, yelled, clapped and shouted their final condolences to John Peel (RIP). You know deep in your heart of hearts that up in heaven there are countless souls who may now get the chance to have their music played on Elysium FM. Meanwhile, back on earth, we'll have to start forgetting about the radio as an opportunity to hear new and worthwhile music. Peely was an epoch unto himself.
Mike said that Three Litre weren't playing new tunes, but I hadn’t heard much of their opening material, and I thought it was really good. As usual the banter and stage presence was top-drawer, but for me it was an ear-opener to hear Graham singing (and he'll probably deny this strenuously) sincere songs from the heart. I thought they were new songs, and I thought they were really good - wish I could remember the titles (or even some lyrics), but suffice to say that although the Litre do "comedy" pub rock about as well as it can be done, they remain a hugely underrated band by being associated with the genre. They're tight as a gnat's chuff, even for a three-piece, Pete and Darren both dispense their duties - on bass and drums respectively - to an impressive degree, and they can play a soft ballad as effectively as they can rock out around a big riff. I think it's safe to say that they have a firm hold on the affections of the local scene in these parts, and last night they played a stormer, even if British Beef had chased off the crowd in large chunks.
Well, that's what I thought, anyway.
With a name like that, they should be an entourage of strippers, a wrestling tag-team, the UK's representative at the UN complaints committee or a brand/flavour of soup. What they definitely should NOT be is a three chord punk band. Not with that name, anyway. British 182 or Beef Charlotte (Beef Shalottes? Sounds tasty, eh?) would be better. To give them their due, they had all the brash confidence of a band who had been signed by Sony and were probably going to be force-fed down the ears and eyes of every grumpy, hoody-wearing teenager from Newcastle to Newquay. They made jokes about "pot", swore occasionally and wore t-shirts that made them look like they knew what they were doing (although how you can wear Ramones and Metallica tees and STILL produce the aural equivalent of dysentry I will never know. Sony probably hired a camp Italian stylist to polish their image).
The crowd called out for "Year 3000" in between songs, which almost provoked a reaction from the band (besides making even more bad noise), but Busted would have been popular, teacher's pet, apple-polishing do-gooders at school, and British Beef would have been the disenfranchised, surly and disgruntled mob sitting at the back of the class trying to stencil band logos onto their pencil cases.
Ah, at least they had a few solo's in their tunes. They weren't very good, but they were played pretty well.
Then, after they had slunk off to consider a career as professional band-wagon chasers, the stage was clear for Reading's top light-entertainers Three Litre to take charge and try and salvage what was left of the crowd after British Beef had sent them scattering elsewhere. The black arm bands on display were for John Peel, as we soon found out. Graham announced that in honour of his passing his merry band of troubadours expected everyone in attendance to cough up and pay their respects by observing a one-minute's noise (very apt, and hugely respected by the crowd). Cue crashing, thrashing, screaming and wailing from the Litre while the crowd whistled, yelled, clapped and shouted their final condolences to John Peel (RIP). You know deep in your heart of hearts that up in heaven there are countless souls who may now get the chance to have their music played on Elysium FM. Meanwhile, back on earth, we'll have to start forgetting about the radio as an opportunity to hear new and worthwhile music. Peely was an epoch unto himself.
Mike said that Three Litre weren't playing new tunes, but I hadn’t heard much of their opening material, and I thought it was really good. As usual the banter and stage presence was top-drawer, but for me it was an ear-opener to hear Graham singing (and he'll probably deny this strenuously) sincere songs from the heart. I thought they were new songs, and I thought they were really good - wish I could remember the titles (or even some lyrics), but suffice to say that although the Litre do "comedy" pub rock about as well as it can be done, they remain a hugely underrated band by being associated with the genre. They're tight as a gnat's chuff, even for a three-piece, Pete and Darren both dispense their duties - on bass and drums respectively - to an impressive degree, and they can play a soft ballad as effectively as they can rock out around a big riff. I think it's safe to say that they have a firm hold on the affections of the local scene in these parts, and last night they played a stormer, even if British Beef had chased off the crowd in large chunks.
Well, that's what I thought, anyway.
# posted by AK @ 15:01 
