Lords begin proceedings by bringing out thunderous, balls to the wall, riffs that threaten to kick my heart through the back of my ribs. Their southern fried rock and roll is so loud I can hear my ears ringing between each song. It helps that the singer looks like a priest who’s been kicked out of the church for having too much fun with the communion wine, or perhaps something a little stronger. Some of their songs do sound a little samey but when they have songs like ‘The Redeemer’, a chest thumping anthem which builds up to the sweetest riff-o-rama release I’ve heard in a long time then it’s perfectly easy to forget the parts that sound familiar.
Bilge Pump are an odd prospect. They contain all the ingredients for something that I should love, but it seems that they’ve been mixed improperly. When they hit the right notes they manage to make a sublime racket that has my body convulsing with joy, other parts just leave me cold. For me there is too much needless ‘avant-garde’ noisy breakdowns. They take me out of the moment as I watch the guitarist have what looks like a conniption. The drummer is a wonder to behold though, with little jazzy flourishes and rolls he often manages to keep the music from spinning off into the realms of the self congratulatory.
I saw Oxes four years ago in Brixton, shortly before they went on hiatus. I was sure that would be the one and only time I would get to witness their off brand of ‘math-rock’. Most bands that go on the dreaded ‘hiatus’ never come back from it. At The Drive-In I’m looking at you. However tonight the three odd balls that complete Oxes are there on stage ready to rock out and have a good time. As to be expected from an Oxes gig there is a fair amount of ‘mucking about’. The two guitarists dart into the crowd only to pop back up from the side or back of the stage, or even through the crowd, their wireless guitars allowing them to enact with the audience as they’re unencumbered by trailing wires and of course climbing atop the infamous boxes they have at the front of the stages so that they tower above the audience like rock-gods. Drummer Chris Freeland offers people biscuits between songs and tries to get the crowd involved in some mid-set scatting in order to ‘loosen up’. They also take a pop at the lack of crowd participation from ‘London crowds’ by refusing to carry on playing until they count them back in, the first attempt at this ends with a short rendition of Tom Jones ‘It’s not unusual’ with slightly different lyrics “It’s not unusual for London to miss its obvious clues”. It’s all good natured though and their point is shown to be not quite right when one plucky young audience member accepts the invitation to get up onstage to sing during a cover of Nirvana’ ‘Drain You’. Its two parts rock show to one part farce. However they still manage to get through a slew of classics. Opening with Boss Kitty they quickly follow with an incredibly muscular version of Half, Half & Half. They even manage to play my current favourite song from their E.P ‘Top Trucker’ which is a slight deviation from their usual formula. In the hands of a lesser band all of the arseing about would have been cause to complain about the amount of songs that didn’t get played. It’s such a great sight to see the three of them lock into a groove, when they’re all on stage that is, it’s easy to forgive them. When a band is this talented it’s hard to hold a grudge when they just want to have fun.
Words: Andy Devine
Pictures: Sarah James
2 responses so far ↓
1 locustscomeinspring // Oct 30, 2008 at 4:37 pm
I was going to do a ‘bands you should know’ on Oxes but I thought as I was doing this review then it could serve as an introduction for most people.
I’d tell you check out their myspace page but it’s full of jokey songs which arent’ actually on either of the albums or the EP but everyone should check them out as they’re fucking amazing.
Bilge Pump and Lords and have myspace pages however and they’re both worth checking out.
Bilge Pump: http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=35449592
Lords: http://www.myspace.com/lords
Lords are also playing tonight at Old Blue Last and doing a free instore at Puregroove records tomorrow if you fancy checking them out.
2 djm // Oct 31, 2008 at 7:34 am
Great review and I particularly like the through-the-legs photo.
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