I (don’t) hate rock n roll. Primal Scream get down at The Scala

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As a teenager trapped in a steel town with little cash and only my mind as means of escapism it was inevitable that I would turn to tunes to soothe the crushing numbness of nothingness that hung around in the air.

It started with simple rock n roll  - it wasn’t even real rock n roll – it was some sort of working man’s club revival with aged fellas in drapes sporting DAs and thus there was an inevitable Showaddywaddy type lock on, Shakin’ Stevens and Stray Cat struts and shit.  Don’t get me wrong it filled a hole. I know it was only rock and roll but I liked it. From there I would listen to Elvis, Carl Perkins, Eddie Cochran and through that came The Stones and The Beatles.  This would have been back in the early eighties.

By 1985 I had stopped my association with rock and roll. It wasn’t that I hated it but I associated rock and roll with the worst excesses of TOTP culture  - all men in denim with collars up shaking their hips and pursing their lips but looking like stout middle aged men hanging on to some sort of milkshake dream – you know it’s not Nashville it never would be – it’s Ashby and we’ve got a Kwik Save.  

I had begun to define my self in opposition to this. I began to hate rock and roll and all those people with nothing to show.

Yet looking back I was simply a rock and roller by another name.

My rock and roll was reaching beyond the kiss curl and jumpsuits. It wanted it to be fierce and untamed. It began with The Velvet Underground. It would take some time to find the dirty end of scuzz rock and bawling but in the beginning The Velvets provided this antidote to the bland chug a lug-lug-lug of the behemoth rock and rollers.  Screeching and full of bittersweet romance and loss The Velvets was the band I wanted to be in. Artful outsiders to the mainstream of fat rock and rollers – maaaan.  Appropriation occurs at every stage of living when you are a youth – so I searched out winkle pickers, tight black canvas and blunt scissors for bowl headed cuts.

And then as I was morphing into my own zone came the Jesus and Mary Chain. Year zero for the rebirth of independent pop music. It was 1985. Suddenly it was the ‘rebirth’ of rock and roll in this house. Screaming teenagers and loss of control.  

Real rock and roll.

Maximum rock and roll.

Bobby Gillespie was part of this new rock and roll. Two drums and this supra-cool aesthetic. It was instant love – heaven’s above! Then there was talk that he was only moonlighting in the most original band I’d ever heard. The Jesus and Mary Chain were a band who’d taken all the elements of rock and roll and merged them into one pure blast of sonic magic. But this Gillespie had another band – a band called Primal Scream.  Cool name and one cool motherfucker. So into town to purchase their single was the next move – once again you have to remember that we weren’t downloading this and having a listen through streaming. You had to go to the shop ask for a copy – sometimes order it – without listening and then buy it – we weren’t brave enough to listen to it in store and say no. So it would be bought, bagged up and returned to bedrooms to revolve on cheap record players turned up loud (when we could get away with it.)

‘Crystal Crescent’ was a beautiful song. Psychedelic and tripped out lite and tight not noise and full of rage. There was a gentle side to this rock and rolling. Flip the record and find Velocity Girl. Simple, chiming and over in seconds.

Suddenly there was a new rock and roll in town.

And that rock and roll was in town again tonight (or in this case a few weeks back as it’s taken far too long to write this) Primal Scream played the Scala for a night of maximum rock and roll.  And after many years I was back in the fray again. I sort of lost touch with the Scream after the heady Screamadelica days and lows of the Give Out but Don’t Give Up long player. It wasn’t that I didn’t like them but rather they were verging on something I wasn’t quite aligned to. I’d got rid the winkle pickers ( as had they) and most sounds in my head were electronic and made for dancing to through the night. The Scream seemed to be mutating into something like the behmoths I couldn’t take anymore – it had all gone a little too rock n roll.  

But how wrong I was.

Following ‘Give Out’ came a blistering set of long players and The Scream found that Stooges fright and scowl blended with motoric electonica that was always at the heart of what they did/ do. Tonight is no exception. It’s the greatest hits and they are the greatest. A two-bit indie rock band from Glasgow with all killer and no filler delivered a wonderful evening of music for the maximum capacity crowd rammed into The Scala on a Tuesday evening.

Opening with the gospel rock of ‘Movin’ On Up’ Gillespie resplendent in Flying Burrito Brothers meets Viet Cong black suit whips up the crowd to a frenzy and we are only one song in. This is a stripped back Scream this evening and possibly for the future. Innes – blue tonic suit, pork pie hat and Hawaiian themed shirt (perhaps he was going on holiday afterwards), Duffy tucked behind the keys (I can’t tell you what he was wearing – I couldn’t see him), Simone pwering away on bass and Darrin firmly sat behind the kit.

Tonight’s proceedings take in 1986 to the present. A full on 33 years. Gillespie still has that awkward charm of a man who knows he’s a rock and roll star but isn’t going to pander to the obvious. Tight lipped except a few acknowledgements and thanks and a heartfelt tribute to the very recent death of Jake Black from the Alabama 3. Gillespie lets you know how he feels through the songs.

Innes is in towering form with his guitar tonight and being up and close is a  pleasure. The last time I saw the Scream was at a festival and everyone was talking through ‘Damaged’. It wasn’t great. Tonight though they can see our eyes and we can see the whites of theirs. And it all makes for an hour and half of sonic mayhem and merriment.  Every tune is greeted with a cheer and there was always one part of the crowd bellowing out the words and boogying on down whether the tunes were coming from Sonic Flower Groove or Chaosmosis.

It was wonderful to see The Scream acknowledge some of the tunes that had brought me to their door so long ago. ‘Velocity Girl’ was aired tonight and it probably hasn’t been played since 1988. It was longer and there was a sense that Gillespie had done a Lou (Reed) on it with a change in inflection of the lyrics. But you know what. He wrote it  - he can sing it however he likes. We didn’t have a surprise visit from Martin St John. I think the ‘Confessions of a Primal Screamer’ but the stop to that. So there are no tambourines but Bobby did have maraccas. 

And Innes got the Rickenbacker out for a blistering ‘Imperial.’ Which for old men like me was a lovely addition.  I was gutted that we didn’t get ‘Ivy Ivy Ivy’ from the second album even though it had apparently been soundchecked in Brighton the day before – but hey ho the set list made up for it with sublime cuts from Vanishing Point (Kowalsi and Star) and Exterminator (Accelerator, Kill All Hippies and Swastika Eyes – with Innes in full siren effect)

Of course we got ‘Loaded’. And we had a party. We had a good time. With Gillespie holding his microphone aloft for the crowd to chant back at him as he grinned from ear to ear. I think the biggest surprise for me was seeing just how popular ‘Country Girl’ is for The Scream. It’s a sure fire crowd pleaser. I wasn’t too certain when Riot City Blues came out. I was in the camp that I thought they could do better with what they had but clearly that’s the reason why I never ran a record label nor fronted a successful band.  Bobby is in his element and the stripped down Scream give all their worth in a rock hoe down and the crowd sing along in unison to what seemingly is their ‘biggest’ hit. And I guess that’s what it’s all about. You don’t last 33 years if you don’t have the tunes that make the whole crowd sing. Tonight Primal Scream don’t even play half of the ones they have in the locker. This is a rock and roll band that can command a crowd.

When I think back to those early days of catching glimpses of Primal Scream on TV you can see that it’s all still there in Bobby G and his merry band of brothers and sisters. It’s charisma, self-belief and the ability to have a god time.

Primal Scream were good tonight.  

Actually Primal Scream were great tonight.

Primal Scream are a maximum rock and roll band.

I think I might love rock n roll again.

Panda Bear was loose in London

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I have enjoyed the thrills of live sounds for years and years. There’s something magical about the experience of seeing something you committed to your memory through repeated revolutions on record players suddenly becoming real for your ears in a building with the minds that made it there in front of you.

I can remember most of the gigs, shows, sets, concerts – what ever you wish to call them – that I have attended - not the literal evening but sensations, snippets, sounds and smells that conjure up a moment or an emotion that was lodged way in my brain. Fleeting images of my heroes played out in mind films on the surface of my eyes.

Panda Bear at the Village Underground on Tuesday is now firmly lodged in the cerebral mass of synapses and connections. I am a fan of Panda Bear – you all should be a fan of Panda Bear – because there’s a beauty within those electronic collages that soothes the soul.

For those unaccustomed to Panda Bear – he is actually Noah Lennox – and one part Animal Collective. I came to Animal Collective after listening to Panda Bear – not the other way round.  I like Animal Collective but I like Panda Bear more. Each tune he has released has wrapped itself around my heart and made me smile that little longer – not that they are all happy tunes mind.

I arrive at the Village Underground a little early. So I head off for a drink in graffiti covered buildings and hip surroundings.  I buy a drink. It costs £5.80.  Ridiculous really.  I think The Smiths t-shirt I bought at one of my first concerts cost £5.

Some time the city is out to rip you off.

Panda Bear is playing in East London tonight – but this is no rip off – this is not a rock n roll swindle.  And this is his one date in the city as he waltzes through Europe and beyond. There is only one day to spend with this homie. Not even a day – it’s only a night.

But I’m glad I spent it with you.

Proceedings begin with Maria Reis who produces sounds that are both haunting and jaunty – there’s a popness to her MBV meets Eno tunes.  The crowd are warm in their appreciation and the cavernous building  - with it’s bar on the side making it difficult to see the stage  - feels intimate as she plays to the swelling numbers.

And then we wait for PB.  I have managed to find a spot way down the front about two bodies back and to the right of the stage. The crowd is hip and youthful – but I don’t care - I am an old man taking space from the youth. I dig this too. 

I wait for the arrival of Noah.  At 9.30 the lights dim and Panda Bear enters the room – he takes off his coat- keeps on his hoodie - picks up the microphone and begins to create sonic alchemy. Tonight’s ‘show’ and to be fair it is a ‘show’ is full of repetitive visuals and strobed lights and screens there to add and support the wonderful sounds of the Bear’s workbench.  I’m intrigued by the workbench – it looks cobbled together with MDF to hold instruments that shake the very soul.  Noah works this table of instruments(?) throughout the set – sounds blending and growing from his array of special units and keys – drones become fragments of songs and layers of sound build upon each other into this beautiful digital cacophony offset with sweet harmonies and honest feelings.

To be honest it’s hard making out what I’m listening to – I never got hold of the last vinyl only ‘A Day with the Homies’ but I guess this is what I’m listening to interspersed with songs from when he took on the Grim Reaper and won. There’s a few older ones too all presented with a backdrop of a pulsating dancing woman in garish make up and flowing dresses. It’s a trip maaaaaaan. A real mind bending trip. But the audience are here for the ride – there’s a group behind me bellowing the words and dancing with wild abandon – we are here to worship at Lennox’s sonic altar – we are his disciples – which is apt because it’s just after Easter that he walks amongst us.

The night develops through each sample and repetitive drone with the Panda adding vocals as loops become recognizable tunes  - it’s hard to know where to clap – so I just grin throughout. The new tunes are harder in terms of beats – there’s elements of hip hop, drum and bass and the inevitable dubstep – but it doesn’t feel bandwagon jumping more an evolving landscape of sound that Panda Bear inhabits. The set consisted of this according to setlist.com

Dolphin (New Song)

Flight

Boys Latin

I Know I Don't (New Song)

Part of the Math

Cosplay (No Outro)

Cranked (New Song)

Shepard Tone

Crosswords

Home Free (New Song)

Selfish Gene

Cosplay Demo (Outro)

The end of the set before the encore slowly built into a huge pulsating bass drone with vomiting visuals and strobes. It was heavy work. But there’s absolute heavy soul in his squelching electronic psychedelia.

Lennox is not a dance musician  - but we sway in unison at times to his kinetic rhythms and futuroid B(each) Boy singing – because after all  his voice remains his secret weapon. It’s what everything hangs on –and follows this incredible set with an encore of three incredible works  - Sabbath (New Song), Crescendo (New Song) and finally Sunset with each one getting better than the last.  We are uplifted and dancing – and then he is gone.

Coat on and out the building – well probably not - but I want to afford him some rock star status – not that he is that at all but he deserves to held up a little higher than he is. It’s hard to find music that resonates and connects in this digital forever streaming age and Panda Bear is making incredible tunes that will stand up and be re -evaluated in future years.

I’m glad Panda Bear played at the Village Underground and you will be glad next time he plays – because you’ll be there too.

Here's a Part of the Math from France - I can't find any videos from London - but you get the idea. 

Moogie Boogie in London - Euros is back in Town

It’s been a long time since the roogie boogie visited this part of town. I’ve been all caught up in suits and presentations and unable to get any thoughts down other than those that generate pay slips.  I haven’t been writing about music. And sometimes listening is not enough.

Where’s the fun gone in all of this?

Luckily Euros was back to revive the vibe. 

Euros Childs has been officially released from House Arrest and is now out and about to bring us light ( and some dark) in the winter evenings.  It’s been two years since he was last in this part of town. So it only seemed right that I should spend time in his company two times – and as luck will have it he decided to play two wonderfully storming utterly beautiful ‘shows’ in London.

So the roogie boogie is back. Well - a different type of roogie boogie

Double the time and double the pleasure.

And it’s always a pleasure when Euros is in town. His errant psychedelic left field skewed view of the world can’t fail to delight. And delight it does with the packed house in North and South London on a Sunday and a Monday evening this week.

Tonight Euros and Rosie are a two piece bent on giving us a rocking good time. It’s a different experience to the Roogie Boogie band but no less intense. The addition of a new Moog strengthens the bass and (rouche) rumble within the mix. 

Moogie Boogie.  

And at the Sebright it’s genuinely heart shaking –  the moog that is - although that might have been where I was sat – or where I’m at.

The stage is set up and is reminiscent of a low budget indie Rick Wakeman – lots of keyboards and wires (and a phone – for the drums  - well some of them) and a lonely two piece kit at the back. And whilst Euros isn’t playing a brand of noodling prog rock ecstasy there’s a nod to it – especially the wigged out psychedelia of Dust – heard on both nights in a mighty melee of sound and confusion  – all fingers and palms and repetitive bass. 

As ever Euros entertains – how can he not –  and there’s something magical when these songs come alive in packed houses – and both were packed houses.

The 'House Arrest' tour has only just begun – date after date in carefully considered venues across the land and Euros always seems to choose interesting venues  - both shows in London are in great places – I arrived early on Sunday to the Sebright Arms – a lovely venue – with fantastic sound- tucked away behind a main road in Cambridge Heath. 

Euros has a new long player to plug and sometimes you head into these journeys knowing what to expect – but this time I wasn’t sure – I had listened to the album once – in fits and starts – I had some idea of melody and lines but hadn’t yet immersed myself in Euros’s world. So there was that thrill of the new – the unexpected in the air.  

This was also Euros without the Roogie Boogie band  - it’s a new band I guess.

It’s the new thing. 

I also had my picture taken by a man who was convinced I was Vic Reeves. He wouldn’t let  it lie.

Rosie opened up for the main event ( at the Sebright) in the guise of 'Oh Peas' with soaringly tragic and introspective black anthems about loss and love. Not exactly cheery – but bleakly magnificent if you like to shed a tear on a Sunday. 

Then Euros arrived to the theme from Ski Sunday  (which is actually called “Pop Looks Bach’ pop pickers)  As you know by now a Euros concert is one underpinned by incredible songs and heartfelt laughs – he never misses a beat – the audience murmur to each other beforehand that seeing him always leaves you happy – that he makes you laugh ( in a good way) 

And that’s the Euros experience in a nutshell – I’ve been watching him in various venues for years now and always leave feeling some how happier. The set tonight is a mixture of the new and some old – but it wasn’t what I expected.  Songs are pulled from House Arrest, Refresh, Cousins, Bora da and Son of Euros – I think. I never got hold of the set list so I’ve been trying to piece it together in my head.

I wasn’t sure about 'Refresh' on first hearing – it was difficult and seemed to be facing inwards – explosive in the layers of samples and resamples. But if you keep on in there it is refreshing (see what I did there?) And 'Pick it Up' is exceptional in its airing on both nights – basically a rallying call to pick up the shit on the street, in the park, on the beach. It takes a mundane thing and transcends to the magically. It’s about shit – shit on your shoe, in your hair – it’s thoroughly far out.

On stage Rosie and Euros flit between synths ,drums, guitar ( well not so much the guitar)  and phone (for the drums  - there’s an App for that) to summon up melody fuelled monsters of delight. There’s that open honesty in the songs that is somehow infectious to the watching audience – creating connections from the darker end of the street. Songs about eating disorders – Euros needs a list tonight – hastily pushed to the side of the keyboard to name all the foods that 'Christy and Misty' get through  – not to mention the waiter who ends up on a spit  and with its tempo changes and refrain you get a sense of Sgt Pepper – especially Being for the Benefit of Mr Kite, or the obsessive 'Shower' taker – safe within the waters of his own home, the yearning ambition to pursue a 'Stuntman' career, the trials of being a bag – a 'yellow bag', an incredible version of 'Peanut Dispenser' - which surely must be it's first airing in years and years - and I haven't been able to shake it from my head for days - or just the bliss that it is to exist in a 'Happy Coma'. Which gets us all singing the chorus and empathising that not all things are bad. Well not until your life support is switched off.  

And of course colanders. Mine is rocking back and forth. How about yours?

The set tonight is wonderful – the sound is sharp, taut and visceral. And we get 'Look at My Boots '– at first a stuttering attempt at the end of the set that eventually becomes 'Jane (Not her real Name)' from Cousins – which is a bonus.

But then correctly in the encore.  A song of studied coolness about boots and fridges. 

Waiting for Euros to comeback on after lights down at the end of the set you can feel that energy he creates – the crowd are chanting – I’m clapping – they are clapping – we are all clapping and there really was a roar when Euros returned to the stage – he’s a well liked man – they are a well liked band in these parts.

But I’m out the door on Sunday - no time to wait in queues for CDs and signatures – but it doesn’t matter as I’m seeing Euros in Nunhead the next night – closer to home.  

Nunhead is a different affair – all knitting clubs and real ale. The venue is a community run public house and venue – it's a nice place – with gold lame curtains on a foot and half high stage – sort of ballroom blitzed.  Tonight there are two other turns before the main event – Garden Centre a fella and basically a neurosis belting out childlike squalls and screams about things I have little time to care about.  And then The Gentle Good who's worked with another Mynci  - all intricate picking and lilting songs of moths, birds, love and open water, the rightside of folk for me – not overly jumpers and roll ups.

Tonight the entrance is to the Monty Python Theme (actually called Liberty Bell – pop pickers). Now just so you know two nights of Euros really isn’t that excessive in my book – but I had been asked why I was going again considering I’d seen the band last night. I don’t think I need to explain it really – I’ve said it here before – being in a room with Euros makes you feel good. And I could see some familiar faces in the crowd – we’ve been standing in rooms with Euros for sometime.

We will continue to stand in rooms with Euros.

We like it that way. And I was only coming from down the road – I spoke to a Japanese woman – Fujiko (I think that’s her name) who I have seen at many of these nights – she had come from Tokyo. So let’s get it in perspective.

I like Euros Childs. Lots of us like Euros Childs. She really likes Euros Childs.

Tonight was just as brilliant. A set peppered with the same songs from the previous evening but mixed up a little. The sound was dense – and didn’t pack the clarity of the Sebright Arms ( ‘More drums’)  – if I’m being critical -  but there was still the beauty in the room.  ‘Turning Strange’ sounds magnificent on both airings over the weekend – in theory its 80s sounding chords shouldn’t work – but Euros weaves that simplicity and feeling through it. It has a Brian Wilson nod – like it could have been co produced by Dr Eugene Landy and ended up on Wilson’s first solo album.

It’s mesmerising. Full of harmony and warmth. 

It’s on the new album – you should buy it.

You probably have.

And then with a final flourish they finish with Godmalding (pronounced – God -Mal -Ding to help with the scansion – as it didn’t know it was going to end up in a Euros song) the night was over.  

I hope that Euros is not placed under House Arrest for another two years. 

He's been missed. 

But just so you know he will always have a welcome roof in this part of town.

You can buy the album from the man himself  from here  You can also get all the other albums too - and you know they are all worth a listen.

The House Arrest continues right up till mid December - see him before he returns home and gets locked back in again. 

Here are some videos from Nunhead The Ivy House - I can't find any from the Sebright Arms ( credit to the people who filmed them  - thanks)