The Sheffield Scenester

With Sheffield’s local established band, The Last Standing and the legendary night which is Soundclash, it made perfect sense to collaborate the two to Host The Last Standing’s first birthday bash…a partnership as dreamy as John Lennon and Yoko Ono….

These days, gig-goers are more concerned with desperately trying to portray a cool- scenester image, forgetting about the love and passion for the music…this means they miss out on little gems like Liam Walsh…definitely the wild card of the night and at only fifteen years old, his steely confidence was one of the first things I noted… Walsh, manages to hold the crowds attention, giving us a short musical-biography and explaining his set will consist of genres from Indie to Reggae…I am intrigued…he opens with ‘Blood On My Hands’ and strums the guitar in an aggressive way, showing no fear of the instrument…Walsh delivers the vocals with a hard grain to his voice, all a continuous theme of this teens self-assurance…he really seemed to have captured the crowds attention and demands the venue is filled with his sound…Walsh, delivers a few respectful covers like The King Blues ‘I Got Love’ projected in a Tracy Chapman remix; which is unusually well received by the notoriously ‘hard to crack’ early crowd….Walsh continues on to a cover one of my favourite Bob Marley tracks ‘Fussing And Fighting’ translated in a stunning acoustic version; accompanied with sunny ska-esque vocals, the crowd love it and erupt in cheers…he finishes his set with one of his own thought-provoking songs including intelligent political lyrics…this just re-confirms my thoughts that Walsh is wise beyond his years and shouldn’t be under-estimated because of his age…a varied set from this musical-prodigy and at just fifteen years old I can only wonder how he will progress musically…

Rock n Roll band, MonoKing, take their place as the second act of the celebration…a three piece band that openly proclaim they’re influenced by the likes of Oasis, Kasabian, Franz Ferdinand, Muse, The Beatles and Coldplay…from the opening song ‘Benvenuti’ I am instantly captured by the backup vocals’ pitch-perfect wailing…it’s stunning and leaves me with a sigur ros-esque haunted feeling…the lead vocals bear an un-canny vocal resemblance to a young Alex Turner…by this time more revellers had infiltrated and there was a respectable capacity there to watch the set…the second track from their list ‘Tower’ was a galloping, filthy-blues number, this really enticed the crowd and got everyone moving to the infectious rhytmm‘n’blues sound…while the band, undeniably, can play a respectable level of good-quality music, I didn’t feel any connection to the crowd and there was little interaction…some would say they should only be reviewed solely on the music but I feel crowd interaction is an important factor in making a personal connection to the lyrics and music…it’s good showmanship to try and create a hype in the atmosphere and I think it’s their responsibility to do this, it benefits the band more than anything and will help create a following…appearance-wise, I respect they are young and not everyone has the steely confidence of Liam Walsh (probably right from the moment he exited his Mothers’ womb)… I predict they will grow with charisma through age, which will compliment and give a better ‘all-rounder’ edge to their music…MonoKings deliver a few crowd-pleasing covers like Kasabian’s ‘Underdog’ where the vocals really do catch an essence of Tom Meighan, Franz Ferdinand’s ‘Dark Of The Matinee’ and close their set with an Oasis cover…it’s undoubtedly received well by the crowd…unfortunately, doing too many covers could be a danger-zone of labelling these talented guys as a ‘covers-band’ …there is definitely enough talent for the Monokings to develop their own individual sound and image, I hope this grows in the future…

The Hot Soles…The Hot Soles…The Hot Soles…this name is really circulating the Sheffield scene at the moment and creating a massive buzz…as I fully anticipated it to, capacity filled to a maximum, everyone was staring intently at the stage, ready to receive the rock n roll experience we all knew was about to go OFF…I have never witnessed a Sheffield band with such great crowd interaction, they get the participation of their already huge following and include us in their show…their music would probably get away with being dire and their charisma would still save it…but the music is the complete opposite.. it’s sensually hot dirty blues-rock at it’s vibrating best…the blues two-some enter the stage to wild cheers…opening their set with ‘Ready To Burn’ it would be easy to mistake the sound for a four-man band…Kieran Wardle is off, taking over the stage he owns it and the Wilson Pickett passion in his vocals throws him from side to side, gyrating to the off-beat rawness of the sound…he really does astonishingly hold the stage presence of a young James Brown, we are utterly fascinated…..Wardle comments in-between tracks ‘there are some beautiful people out tonight’…the showmanship is second to none…Richard Birkin (drums) expertly projects a massive sound and beats the drums with a break-neck passion…by the end of the set the blues-brothers finish with ‘Enlighten Me’ as with all their tracks, it’s a brilliant feel-good number and the crowd are still going strong, rocking out to every beat delivered…this is definitely a band I would personally tip as one to watch and I am sure their massive following would follow suit…

Next up was rock-blues four piece, Cut Your Wings, my first experience of this band…with an impressive musical background of radio plays and a massive local respect, their reputation proceeded them and I wasn’t disappointed…opening with ‘Rolling Free’ my rock-dar was instantly captured and I found myself enthralled in their set…the crowd was still filled to a maximum and the attention was zoned into the stage…The Hot Soles is a hard act to follow but Cut Your Wings definitely hold their own with their unique sound…Russell Frisby (vocals) naturally oozes rock-quality, sexual-charisma and looks like he could bite the mic off with his teeth at any moment…his vocals are incomparable, they are dark, grungy and addictive…although Cut Your Wings definitely have a blues-rock sound akin to The Black Keys, they have made their own thrash version and it’s astoundingly dark…the atmosphere in the crowd has changed…instead of a comedic-fun vibe, we are all infectiously moving and captivated by the blues-thrash-sound…they move through their set, each track more hard than the next, guitar frets being ripped with a Jimmi Hendrix zeal…Mark Flaherty, expertly drums a booming accompaniment to the inarguably brilliant sound…closing the set with self-aggrandisingly track entitled ‘Cut Your Wings’ we are all still pulsating in the tight space to the irresistible display of grunge rock…nonchalantly exiting the stage to wild cheers I am already thinking about looking up their next gig when I get home…

And finally…the birthday boys…the crowd erupt into a raucous rock n roll version of ‘Happy birthday toooo youuuu’…this isn’t exactly true… but this is what should have happened considering it is The Last Standings’ first birthday bash…the reason we are all here celebrating with quality local music…our best pop-rock band to date, they open their set to the expectant crowd…my first time seeing them live but I am already aware of their established sound…a sound I would describe as a mixture of Dinosaur Jr and The Red Hot Chili Peppers…they’re a local band but portray a big-time semblance… I am instantly impressed and won-over as an avid fan…infectiously good tracks like ‘I Want Never Gets’ (which incidentally has had radio play) transmit through the crowd and demands everyone’s attention to the stage…the guys really handle their instruments expertly and the sound was translated as one of major-label signed band…closing their set to massive cheers and hollering it’s clear to hear why this band have such a steely-loyal following...a brilliant high to my favorite gig of 2011 so far…

Review by Laura Robina Collinson
Interviews by Felicity Crook
Photos by Mickelmas Youngus