The Sheffield Scenester

Last year Soundclash put on the all day S1 gig down at the Academy, this year they opted for the Summer Sizzler down at The Plug, another all day event but this time with a BBQ thrown in! There’s always room for a BBQ at these events and so with Brezza’s ‘Burger Me’ grill set up in the corner of the decking at the back of The Plug, everything was good to go.

Inside Olivia Brown, a young female acoustic artist new to me, was the first act of the night and began with the song ‘Emily’s Heart’. Now despite a nervous start she did have a good voice for the sadder side of life as was evident from her choice of songs…….’Moving To New York’ and ‘Your Song’ are a couple of names that spring to mind. Initially she was in fact stood up playing guitar but decided to take a seat after the second song and so Joolz (Soundclash Promoter) grabbed a bar-stool and helped her on to it, not realizing the footrest was at the back, so she had the misfortune to slowly slide forward during her next song, but once that problem was sorted she relaxed into her set. Finishing with the Nine Inch Nails classic ‘Hurt’ was a bit of a gamble simply because she seems too young to communicate the pain this song evokes and aside from the original, Johnny Cash’s version was a revelation, but aside from that it was a good opening act.

Lord Jester, the following act, had one problem today, bassist Johnathan had a stomach bug and couldn’t play, luckily for them Tom Moz Casserly (Ripoff Britain fame) was able to jump in at the last minute and from the beginning he seemed totally at home. Moz started with a guitar as they all did a quick jam of ‘Rappers Delight’ before venturing into more familiar Jester territory. Lead singer Liam had to do all the vocals on ‘Branflakes’ and almost lost where he was going half way through, I guess Moz isn’t that clued up on breakfast cereals after all! Prior to their set I was sat out back chatting away and ended up being given a brief history of the band from Liam and Nathan. Apparently they were inspired to start the band after seeing Lords Of Flatbush, the song ‘Pikachu’ was written in an hour after a heavy Red Bull session while ‘Branflakes’ was written when they were at school. The name of the band came from a character in an old PS1 game ‘Gauntlet’, originally they were called Naked Ape but it turned out there was a store on The Moor of the same name, so Lord Jester it became!

Velozity were on next but not before I sampled a rather tasty burger which was well worth the three squid I paid for it, just as I was finishing it off the familiar grind of Velozity came knocking on my skull. You could not wish for a more extreme style of music if you tried, this was a brain-pummeling overload but in their defence it was an awesome display. These guys certainly know how to put on a show and whether you like this style of grunge metal or not is up to you but you can’t deny the entertainment value they have on offer. OK they may growl, snarl and even scream at you but out of the madness comes the poetry of songs like ‘Waste Away’, a catchy number that can easily be sung along to, and the final number ‘All About You’ which has a ferocious guitar frenzied climax to it!

From that onslaught, the next band up were Shamble Street, a much lighter affair by far, in fact their music fitted perfectly the idea of a summer BBQ and party as it was, comparatively speaking, light indie pop, almost bubbly at times. With guitarist Tom Hardy dressed as if he had just come from a wedding reception, I immediately wondered if he was going to crack open a Pimms while on stage. The whole set played through with the bounce and energy that you’d expect from The Housemartins, especially the final track of their set, ‘The Best Days Of Our Lives’, always a crowd pleaser, in fact with that attitude they could of played all night for me but since Ripoff Britain were waiting in the wings, their time was up.

Ripoff Britain, with Moz making his second appearance of the night, had no problem keeping the momentum going with a collection of their blues rock classics. Crowd favourite ‘Wasted’ is always a good song to chant along to and it was certainly a surprise to hear my favourite ‘Psychotic Narcotic’ as this ventures into their more Nirvana influenced material – it doesn’t exactly scream party but it is one hell of a tune! The recently acquired fourth member of the band, Ash Clarke, couldn’t be there since he was in Ireland and apparently they had no sound check, but despite the deck being stacked against them they still pulled out a winner of a set. It was a little less bluesy than usual, instead focusing on good old rock but it worked a treat and the crowd obviously loved every minute. Incidentally I don’t know which Moz preferred afterall he definitely looked like he enjoyed his Ripoff Britain set but he did say how much fun Lord Jester was!

The Blackbirds were up next, the newly formed duo of Mark Flaherty and Tom Matthews, now we saw them during Tramlines and the raw blues power was unmistakable, though the PA at the time didn’t do them justice since Tom’s guitar and vocals were practically lost beneath Marks drums. Tonight however, everything was perfectly balanced and whilst their sound was a lot smoother it was still grunge blues but unlike Marks other band Cut Your Wings it wasn’t pounding at your door, this was a much more subtle approach to the genre. Playing the soon to be released track ‘Keep The Lights On’ was definitely one of the highlights of their set but as soon as Tom got out a slider and played a cover of Robert Johnsons ‘Traveling Riverside Blues’, I was hooked. I took the opportunity to chat with Tom earlier in the evening and was given a brief history of The Blackbirds:
Tom used to be a singer for the band Shot Dead and knew Mark when they used to play gigs at The Green Room where Mark worked. Apart from the cover song, the rest of the tracks were written by Tom up in Newcastle as a blues acoustic set, he then asked Mark to lay down a bass drum track and ended up joining forces to create a more electrical blues grunge sound.

By now quite a crowd had gathered since it was the turn of Wolverhampton legends The Lines, one of those bands that always bring a crowd and thanks to their days of playing alongside LMT get a lot of support in Sheffield. Right from the opening notes of ‘Tracey’ through to the final chords of ‘Loudmouth’ they played some of the most hypnotizing music of the night. With some highly accomplished and technically gifted guitar work, an over exuberant guitarist/lead singer in the shape of Alex and some truly mesmerizing songs, they literally were a phenomenon! With Alex going walkabout in the crowd during the song ‘Let It Go’ to fellow guitarist Dean multitasking with keyboards and sample pad on ‘El Matador’ and finally Alex beating out a military tattoo during the final song ‘Loud Mouth’, it was a brilliant set by any standard – mind you I’ve never seen them play a bad one!

The headline act was alternative grunge merchants, Sleepwalker, and they took no prisoners tonight as they opened with a new song, ‘Green High, White Rush’ but it pretty much set the tone for the rest of their set. Hard, fast and loud with high energy guitars and drums coming from all directions while lead singer Greenie, floats between harmony and psychotic possession with his vocals! With plenty of support around the room it really was a great finish to the evening, Skinny on drums looked totally exhausted halfway through and Greenie, from the state of his shirt was sweating buckets but it didn’t stop them from beating you into submission. Tracks like the awesome ‘Deville’ and ‘Legend’ as well as the Nirvana cover ‘Breed’ all spurred the crowd on until they could no longer contain themselves and gave into moshing as the set drew to a close.

When all was said and done, it had been a long day but a very rewarding day with good burgers, a great variety of good music and a great atmosphere throughout, hopefully next year will bring a similar event!

Words and photos by Geoff Buckthorpe & Dean Stead