The Sheffield Scenester

With what appeared to be many people starting their Halloween celebrations early on the Saturday night, it was good to see so many people still out on the town Monday night and still dressed up. Of course SOYO always attracts a good crowd on a Monday night and with fancy dress a must, tonight was going to be a case of good times all round.

The venue was decked out in cobwebs, Jack O Lanterns and of course ghoulish cakes courtesy of Amy Sharabang, all it needed now was music and people. Musically the first act on the billing tonight was Don Barrell Gents, in our opinion a highly accomplished duo, whose skilful guitar work is admirably matched by their on stage banter. Each time we see them we happily switch off our surroundings and tune in as they beguile us with various songs, whether it’s the fact that we sit back and simply listen or as was pointed out by a friend of ours focus on their style of play is irrelevant. If all you want are beautiful and evocative songs put together with a technical skill, above and beyond your average acoustic, then these are the guys for you.

As they played on people started drifting in and the costumes slowly arrived, one early collection was a group of young girls dressed as blood-splattered schoolgirls, a common theme over the weekend, but it wouldn’t be Halloween without a St Trinians bloodbath! Stood at the bar were a couple of guys fully dressed in homemade KISS costumes, one done up as Catman, the other as Starchild, now we like everybody else in the room automatically assumed they were just out for a party, turns out they were the next band on stage, The Grand Old Ukes Of Yorkshire! As soon as they began the opening notes of ‘Happy days’ with a couple of ukulele’s, you knew straight away that this was definitely gonna be a tongue in cheek set. Following this with one famous song after another, such classics as ‘Eye Of The Tiger’, ‘I Believe I Can Fly’ and ‘Back For Good’ all received this treatment, even ‘C’est La Vie’ which was their token Halloween song to which Starchild uttered the immortal phrase “Oh f*cking hell I hate this one!” So it was a good half hour of fun and definitely not to be taken seriously, but the joke never became boring as they did tweak the songs a bit with high tempo chorus’s thrown in along with daft banter.

With no genre left unscathed by their performance quite a crowd of misfits, monsters and ghouls had drifted in to see what on earth was going on, and so the party was in full swing with the likes of the Toy Story cast, Lego-brick men, Catwomen, witches, Scooby Doo and from somewhere a life size Incredible Hulk, it was time for Famous Villains to hit the stage. With the lead singer of the highly respected Wallbirds fronting this band, we knew we were in for a real treat and they didn’t let us down one bit. All the energy and bounce were there, but with a little less folk influence and a lot more rock ‘n’ roll pumped in, which when put together deliver one of the liveliest sets we’ve seen at SOYO for a while. When you consider this was their debut gig as well, it really was quite an achievement, they were tight and the crowd, latching onto this loved every minute! Dancing along to songs such as ‘Ready To Die’ and the finale to their set ‘Lying At The Side Of You’, both full of enough tempo and pumping rhythm to wake the dead, which in the case of several zombies swaying around the room, worked a treat.

As the time came for Volcanoes, a band we first caught a few years back at Tramlines performing an outstanding version of The Bangles hit ‘Walk Like An Egyptian’, even more outlandish costumes appeared. I really have no idea what Roy Chubby Brown has to do with Halloween but he was there, Scooby Doo made sense as did the ‘Hey You Guys’ from Goonies, of course the odd demonic clown was inevitable, but Super Mario, where’d he come from?

Volcanoes, a band that is never afraid to take risks, decided to come dressed as bananas and chillies (WTF?) except the bass player who turned up dressed as Bananaman (WTF****?). But in the spirit of the night they had a great time trying to play like this, except of course lead singer Samson who did have quite a few problems with his banana suit as it obviously wasn’t designed for a naturally hyperactive front man to play guitar in, but he managed to wrestle it into submission long enough to finish the set. With what can only be described as a quirky indie beat they stumbled through, definitely lacking in conventionality is their greatest asset as you never quite know what is around the corner with these guys. The almost spasmodic opening riff to ‘Vexihomp’ has just enough beat enough to keep it within the realms of accessibility, while ‘Little Feet’ - a song written about the birth of Samson’s baby son....is hardly a lullaby but remains one of their most gentle songs. ‘Beat Me To The Bull’, a track loaded with stuttering chords and desperate vocals, brought the evening’s live acts to a close, admittedly it would of been great to hear ‘Who’s The Badchild’ but nevermind!

It really was a great night for both SOYO and Scenester and nothing makes a party rock like an excuse for fancy dress so a big thank you to all those who joined in with the spirit of the evening. Also a thank you to Mark Flaherty who was on hand for DJ-ing duty before Nicola Bear took over the helm to carry the party on late into the night.