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VenuesReviews Archives - Birmingham101 Home


Previews by Mike Davies

Monday September 1

The Wedding Present

David Gedge still sings off-key, but two decades on from being indie darlings, it’s good to see his seminal outfit’s still got the batteries charged and have proven more influential (listen to the Artics) than might have been reckoned.

They’re back out on the road servicing latest album, El Rey (Vibrant), a reunion with producer Steve Albini who did the honours for Seamonsters, and yet more tales of  unreliable relationships, this time littered with such references to America as the Santa Monica Freeway, Spider-Man and even Winona Ryder.

Unusually, Gedge seems to have polished up his accessibility stick here, with tracks like the jangling Don't Take Me Home Until I'm Drunk, Santa Ana Winds, Spider-Man On Hollywood and, once past the two minute intro, The Thing I Like Most About Him Is His Girlfriend all catchy, radio friendly melodies.

Of course, if you prefer to work at things, you can always take the angular riffs of Soup and Boo Boo, the slow low level rumbling to The Trouble With Men or the gathering anthemic sludge of Lost The Monkey and Model, Actress, Whatever.

Heading towards his 50s, it’s probably about time Gedge sorted out a settled relationship he could write about rather than yet more tales of being given the elbow, but then he’s always been better at being the bridesmaid rather than the bride. 7pm. £11. Barfly


Tuesday September 2

Bryn Christopher

A new Birmingham old soul boy, Christopher deservedly set superlatives fluttering with debut single, The Quest A song about his brother’s experiences serving in Basra, it ably demonstrated that when he cites Al Green, Sam Cooke, Otis Redding and Nina Simone as influences he's not just looking to boost the bio hype.

Warm, muscular, deep with a fiery passion and bolstered by a tight horn section and musicians weaned on Stax milk, we're talking the new Terence Trent D'Arby, Roland Gift, Percy Sledge and Seal rolled into one. New single, Smilin’(Polydor), has a slightly more psychedelic pop twinge to its rolling gait while, from the upcoming My World album, Gone Gone Gone suggests The Temptations doing Northern Soul and the handclapping beat, brass parps and urgent rhythm drive of  Seconds Ago has Amy Winehouse getting into bed with his Prince and Jackson grooves.

With Mary J Blige a fan and his acoustic recordings of I've Been Loving You too Long and Bobby Hebb's Sunny suggesting that this is a voice for whom the charts are just a stepping stone to knocking them dead in Vegas, you should catch him while he’s still in the country. 7.30pm. £7.50. Barfly


Wednesday September 3

Gomez

It’s been 10 years and a consistent line-up since Southport’s stoned American roots-blues blues-rock and southern soul crew released Bring It On and, to mark the occasion, like many a recent act, they’re out on tour playing their entire Mercury Music Prize winning debut album from start to finish. Presumably including 44 second playout track Comeback.

 Featuring the dust throated tones of  Ben Ottewell, the album holds up well with its frazzled sun and drugs shuffles and hip hop lurches, with Get Miles still sounding like a loose limbed Tom Waits outtake while Whippin’ Piccadilly, Here Comes The Breeze, Tijuana Lady, Get Myself Arrested and 78 Stone Wobble variously in tune with the current output of Devendra Banhart and Alabama 3.

The Collector’s edition reissue (EMI) comes as a double disc with 11 tracks lifted from two previously unissued 1998 Radio One sessions (including their fine downhome stomp version of Stag O’Lee) and the nine B-sides featured on the album’s  three singles.

While their last studio album, How We Operate, may not have made the UK Top 40, it’s served to consolidate their success in America, tracks finding their way on to episode of House and Grey’s Anatomy, underlining the fact that this tour really is about celebrating their past rather than trying to recapture it. 7.30pm. £20. Carling Academy


Thursday September 4

Jackie Leven

In his press blurb, Leven reckons Lovers At The Gun Club (Cooking Vinyl) is one of the best albums he’s ever made. I doubt anyone’s going to quibble with that, though it’s a little disorienting when the first thing you hear, the ‘psychosexual voodoo redneck’ title track (a wry observation on the connectivity of  firearms, sex and machismo) actually features the liquid sleaze vocals of Johnny Dowd. He also takes spoken verse duties on the sax soaked, neon lite rainy sidewalks slow funk groove of The Dent In The Fender And The Wheel Of Fate. A song about revisiting his dad’s old yellow Lada, it’s one of several numbers reflecting on the past and lost connections.            

There’s the memories of young crushes and runaway lovers on The Innocent Railway, the sense you can never truly go back on My Old Home’s warm Celtic soul and the tender acoustic Woman In A Car while I’ve Passed Away From Human Love is an aching lament of loss and the gospel blues doo wop Head Full Of War examines destructive inner rage.

  It’s a rich and eclectic album. Olivier Blues is a straight rewrite of blues chestnut My Babe, To Whom It May Concern  a spoken Irish mist setting of a poem by Kenneth Patchen, the jaunty countrified Fareham Confidential a  snapshot on a city of lost soul which borrows the melody from Top Of The World and is surely the only song to namecheck Somerfields. And, by way of a bookend, the last track, the yearning hymnal Americana of Heart In My Soul,  not only hands over to another voice, American singer-songwriter David Childers, but is actually lifted from his own Hard Time Country album. Should make for a fascinating evening. 8pm. £8. Kitchen Garden Cafe, York Rd, Kings Heath


Monday September 8

Stevie Wonder

It’s been over a decade since Wonder last toured these shores, three years since he released the underperforming A Time To Love album. However, next year reportedly sees two new conceptually based studio recordings (The Gospel Inspired By Lula and Through The Eyes Of Wonder) while, having claimed his late mother came to him in a dream, he’s now back doing the live thing.

This is the opening night of the UK tour so the set-list is pretty much up for grabs, though with his critical and commercial star not shining as brightly as it did during the 80s chances are it will lean fairly heavily on crowd favourites like Signed Sealed Delivered I'mYours, Higher Ground, Superstition, Living For The City and, of course, I Just Called To Say I Love You. Undoubtedly a musical genius, he can also be a bit self-indulgent, so hopefully he’ll be favouring the former rather the latter traits tonight. 7.30pm. £65/£55. NIA


Monday September 8

Little Man Tate

Somewhat perversely, although they’re just releasing a new album the Sheffield outfit have elected to play a series of shows featuring just former B sides and rarities  with the set list decided by their fans. So, apparently there’ll be no sampling any live showcases from Nothing Worth Having Comes Easy (Yellow Van), doubtless meaning a second tour not too far down the line. You’ll be pleased to hear, though, that it builds confidently on their About What You Know debut, easing out the folkier elements in favour of the cranked up melodic indie guitar pop and anthemic singalong choruses embodied in such numbers as new single Hey Little Sweetie, What Your Boyfriend Said, A Little Heart and the jubilant bounce along Reflection In His Sunglasses.

There’s some slower paced moments, at their best on the vaguely Oasis-like swaying Joined By An iPod, while Shoulder To Sigh On closes out on almost a clunky vaudeville note, but it’s those rousing, arms in the air flurries that carry this off and which you’ll be wishing they’d bend their rules for tonight. 7pm. £10. Bar Academy


Tuesday September 9

Gemma Hayes

The Tipperary singer-songwriter's debut album, Night On My Side, earned a Mercury Music Prize nomination and saw her being compared to the likes of  Beth Orton and Joni Mitchell. However, come the equally fine follow up, The Roads Don't Love You, the fickle nature of the business had seen new names take their place in the next big thing spotlight and, outside of Ireland where she picked up a Best Irish Female Artist award, the album slipped past almost unnoticed. Now comes The Hollow Of Morning (GH), released on her own label and a pretty even balance of the stripped down acoustic and more fleshed out, rockier tracks, but all again sharp with the emotional depth and observations of her past output.

Of the uptempo material, Out Of Our Hands is the most obviously direct though In Over My Head is a shimmering wall of sound that at times feels almost shoegazey and Don't Forget is scuffed beats pop.

However, it's the quieter moments that are the most persuasive; a gently rippling Chasing Dragons where her whispery delivery sounds incredibly strung out and world weary, At Constant Speed's six minute simple synth pulsing reflections on an ended relationship and, showing off guitar dexterity, the dreamy haze of This Is What You Do where she sings in a languid, husky whisper that's both sensual and sad. It's not going to bring a return to the attention she received first time out, but those who've kept the faith will find no disappointments as she wheels them out tonight.7.30pm. £12. Glee Club


Tuesday September 9

Lights, Action!

Listening to mini-album All Eyes To The Morning Sun (Xtra Mile), anthemic, emotionally driven numbers like Aurora, Story of A Broken Boy and Satellites make it almost impossible to talk about the London five piece without comparing them to U2 and The Editors. They’re not yet in either league, but Patrick Currier’s soaring falsetto vocals and the big drama guitars show they have their aspirations well sharpened.  That they also include an organ backed cover of Imogen Heap’s Hide And Seek adds to their credibility weighting, and with debut album Welcome To The New Cold World due in November, their time in the spotlight shouldn’t be far off.

They share the bill with label-mates A Silent Film, a piano-led quartet who’ve seen their share of Keane, Radiohead and Coldplay references on the back of  staccato driving debut Sleeping Pills and recent follow up You Will Leave A Mark, a song about feeling guilty for being born in the West.

Actually, given Robert Stevenson’s vocals, the electronica sheen and racing, pulsing rhythms on both singles, a more likely influence might well be Ultravox and those rain-washed noir streets of Vienna. They’ll doubtless be looking to prove otherwise with the live set which will be showcasing numbers from next month’s debut album, The City That Sleeps. 7.30pm. £5. Bar Academy


Wednesday September 10

The Dodos

Hailing from San Francisco and playing psychedelic folk pop, drummer  Logan Kroeber and songwriter-guitarist Meric Long’s Visiter (Wichita) album comes over like a folk version of The White Stripes, Joe’s Waltz showing they share the same Led Zep influences. But  Kroeber’s inventive percussion on the likes of Ashley, Winter, new single Fools and The Seasons equally suggest Tyrannosaurus Rex while Long’s guitar work on God? and Paint The Rust evokes vintage John Fahey.

Walking comes dappled with country banjo and female harmonies, Red And Purple a Latin flavoured swayer with Kroeber skittering rimshots while Jodi builds from crystal water guitar figures to thundering tumbling clatter. They make a hell of a noise for an acoustic duo and if it’s sounds remotely like this, then the gig should be a stormer. 7.30pm. £7. Bar Academy


Thursday September 11

Kirsty McGee

Rapidly establishing itself as a singer-songwriters venue of note with its eclectic programme of  both rising and established names, this week proves no exception to it high standard of guests. It also affords the Mancunian songstress a chance to unveil her latest album, The Kansas Sessions (Hobopop), one which marks a huge departure from the pastoral contemporary folk and dusty English vocals of  her previous releases.

Recorded, as you might guess, in Kansas, it’s very much an album of old school American folk-country with a dose of New Orleans jazz and vaudeville for good measure.  What she terms, hobopop.

It may also be the best thing she’s recorded. Which, if you’ve heard her three other albums, is really saying something.

There’s a political streak to the material too, whether in the self-styled anti-capitalist New Orleans brassy gospel swing The Profit Song, the good timing (yodelling even) Bonecrusher’s sly metaphor about greed that could well apply to US foreign policy, or the more direct (yet never obvious) banjo dappled carny shuffle Gunsore with its line about ‘bombs that splutter in the road’.

These are finely offset by the personal with songs about loss; of a relationship (the gentle Janis Ian like acoustic filigrees of Sparks, the Baez echoes of the hushed No Way To Treat A Friend,) or trust (a world-weary Faith).

And if anyone’s written a song that captures the itch of paranoid delusion and nervous breakdown better than the skittering Harlem jazz jive and gypsy guitar of Killer Wasps, I’ve yet to hear it.

But, if there’s loss, psychological hives and self-deluding wanderlust (Alibi Blues), there’s also the pledge of love to the burnished Southern  torch sway of Sandman and the mountain music bluegrass of Lamb, the dark passion and sensual intimacy of Dust Devils’ clarinet kissed, Yiddish jazz-blues moods.

Playing live as a duo with fellow multi-instrumentalist Mat Martin, they’ve been described as a Tim Burton version of Simon and Garfunkel. Which sounds incentive enough for anyone’s ears. 8pm. £8. Kitchen Garden Cafe, York Rd, Kings Heath


Friday September 12

Sun Kil Moon

Named for a South Korean boxer and the current vehicle for former  Red House Painters singer-songwriter Mark Kozelek's tales of memory and melancholy, it’s been five years since his last original material with Ghosts Of The Great Highway. But, with a running time that pushes the clock past 70 minutes, he’s certainly made the wait worth the while.

The same applies to the songs and musical mood which, in dealing with trademark themes of loss, loneliness and death, calls to mind the Harvest/Zuma days of Neil Young veined with traces of Nick Drake and, on Harper Road and the disturbingly dark Heron Blue, traditional English folk transplanted to the stark Appalachian mountains. Some might wish to toss the Tim Buckley tag around and, while it’s not without merit, Tonight In Bilbao is probably more a kindred soul to David Ackles.

He turns up the guitars to throaty for The Light and the reverb growling Tonight The Sky, but otherwise his dominant mode is pastoral strum, Lucky Man and Moorestown (one of two numbers previewed on 2006’s Little Drummer Boy live album) both dressed in crystal tinkling guitar arpeggios, the latter gilded with dreamy strings and piano that echo the sadness in his warm wearied voice. 

Mortality and ghosts (of the departed, if not necessarily dead) haunt the album; on the lengthy guitar and violin opener Lost Verses with its reflections on youth, in the angel that whispers word of comfort as she follows him down the Unlit Hallway and, most poignantly, on the closing plucked flamenco guitar Blue Orchids with its reference to his sister’s death.

Drawing on both albums (and quite possible his Modest Mouse tribute collection), it’s not, perhaps likely to be the cheeriest of sets, but sorrow and sadness has rarely been so intoxicating. And, besides, who knows, he may be persuaded to drop in one his AC/DC covers, too. 7.30pm. £12. Barfly


Saturday September 13

Stone Gods

Rising from the ashes of The Darkness, now fronted by former bassist Richie Edwards the new incarnation is a far tougher proposition. They’re back in town plugging the debut album, Silver Spoons And Broken Bones (Integral), having fun with the metal cliches and poses as they swagger their way through fret racing flurry Don’t Drink The Water (think hard rock Mud), Lizzy meets the Faces barroom air punchers Where You Coming From and Start Of Something, Burn The Time and the Bryan Adamsy terrace anthem to a boozy good time Oh Whereo My Beero. With Ronnie Lane style folksy ballad Magadalene a likely live favourite, they’re well worth raising a glass to. 7.30pm. £10. Barfly

 

 

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