The Sheffield Scenester

Another chilling night in Sheffield and what better way to spend a Friday evening then a Soundclash, ever the cornerstone of locally sourced musical talent.

Unfortunately I arrived about 5 minutes into the set of Friends Of Heroes and so was rather surprised to see them, minus drummer, sat on barstools playing an acoustic set. I’ve seen them twice before and they have showed great promise with fast catchy riffs amidst a whirlwind of raging grunge, but put the same music to three guys with guitars and that is a challenge. What came across was a very melodic, almost seductive rendition of some of their classics such as ‘Burn Away’ and the single ‘Our Black Star’, easily one of their best tracks for my money. With its back to basics approach and restrained delivery they could easily have got airplay on Radio 2, obviously the clarity of the lyrics gave away their darker side, but none the less in a strange way it was quite a soothing experience. A pity then that the audience consisted mostly of friends and relatives, possibly this helped put them in a more relaxed mood to play, as it was an interesting variation on their true calling. Personally I prefer grinding bass and hard thrashing metal guitar which they genuinely play so well but it was good to see them adapt under the circumstances. After the set I enquired as to the whereabouts of the drummer, so singer Daniel called him across so he could show me why he couldn’t use his hands - trust me not a pretty sight!!

By now the room had started filling up a bit more, ready to welcome the hip hop/metal stylings of Jackson Caged! From the beginning it is obvious that with the success of bands like Rage Against The Machine, that Jackson Caged are going to go a long way. From the outset Mikes powerful drumming led the guitars into an infectious screeching metal based riot, you couldn’t help but tap along; if I wasn’t taking notes a bit of head banging wouldn’t have gone amiss. With Fraz on vocals the lyrics came across as strong and tongue in cheek, he held a permanent smirk on his face throughout the set. At this point the young crowd just stood back and let them get on with it, pity really since they are obviously a talented group. The ironically named Big M (of the two guitarists he was easily the smaller) happily posed whilst playing at lightning speed – a great showman. The crowd woke up a bit to a cover of ‘House Of The Rising Sun’ but their own songs more than held their own, especially ‘Pardon Me Miss’ with its hilarious albeit X rated chorus. When it came to the final song ‘Jaws’ Big M with guitar in hand took a stroll through the crowd much to their amusement, personally I loved it and will be sure to see them again in the future.

Next up was The Century Kids, one of Sheffield’s finest young indie bands, with Thomas and Jake on dual lead vocals their show started in earnest. The floor by now was full of admiring fans, though initially not alot of dancing which surprised me. No way did this dampen their spirits as they ploughed through their set from one great track to another, they were obviously having a great time on stage especially Thomas who couldn’t stop bouncing around all the time with a massive grin on his face. Once they started the track ‘Kinda Cool’ – by far their best track – their fans couldn’t help but start dancing away, from this point they didn’t look back. Their performance went from good all out fun to a turbo charged frenzy of catchy indie riffs driving along the skilled vocal duet up front; the whole package looked as if they were playing to a stadium. With each show they put on their confidence and professionalism grows as does their fanbase, you’d be a fool to miss them!! What surprised me was that their set just flew by, I had to check my watch to make sure they had actually done the full half hour, sure enough they had, a true sign of a great time!

In complete contrast was the headline act for the night, Never Cry Wolf, a death metal/screamo group with plenty to shout about! From the moment they set themselves up onstage you could almost smell the attitude pore from every orifice; all three guitarists lined up on stage and promptly dived into the first tune head first. With perfectly synchronised stomping they blasted out the opening chords to something, I have to admit due to the vocal stylings of singer Oli it was hard to decipher the song titles, and then he started singing/screaming whatever lyrics seemed necessary – it all could have been in Klingon as far as the crowd were concerned. The obviously shell shocked young audience made way for the traditional thrashing of converted fans by creating a huge circle on the floor for them to ‘do their thing’ in. From a musical perspective I have to say I have no problem, if you’re into the likes of Slipknot or Cradle of Filth then you’ll get the gist of what they’re trying to achieve, they are technically accomplished and obviously love what they do. I hate to admit it though I’ll never understand the screamo approach to singing, but on the bright side as an impartial spectator, the crowd’s reaction does make me laugh, a cross between sheer terror and mind-numbing confusion. In one moment of vocal clarity it turns out the band saw the film Avatar, went away and wrote the song ‘Canopies’, I’m not sure what the connection between unbridled metal mayhem and the tranquillity of a beautiful forest world is but they gave it a shot. This was followed by a cover version of the Lady Gaga song ‘Paparazzi’ which actually woke the crowd up and from this point on they joined in the best they could, bouncing and clapping along. During the final song of the night Thomas from Century Kids joined the band on stage to carry on where he left off by happily bouncing about and encouraging the crowd to do the same, they of course willing obliged.
A great night out courtesy of Soundclash, and good to see another dose of Sheffield’s youth trying something other than indie music, totally recommended!!!!

Words by Geoff Buckthorpe

Photographs by Gez Robinson