The Sheffield Scenester

Walking into The Boardwalk the first thing we noticed was that Paul from Alvarez Kings was DJ for the night, having become accustomed to seeing Russ Frisby on the decks it was a bit of a surprise...of course it made sense since Russ was playing with The Tivoli later that evening....the last thing he needed was to be in two places at once! Unfortunately Paul was having some technical issues and it seemed that he couldn’t get his laptop to work properly with the mixing deck....the bass wasn’t coming through, and so with a lot of head scratching while repeatedly playing Adam And The Ants ‘Prince Charming’, it was eventually sorted just in time for the first of tonight’s acts, Search Party.

Having seen them a couple of times before we had become accustomed to their fast paced and highly energetic style of punk metal, so it was another surprise of the evening to hear them open with the slow yet melodic number, ‘Scream Out’, not the sort of title you’d expect to find attached to such a tuneful song...but it worked! Deep down though, you felt that they were just reaching boiling point in their delivery and any minute were about to explode with a vengeance. This was followed by ‘Wasted Man’ which took them back to the harder and thrashier sound that most people were expecting. One of the highlights of their set was a new track, ‘Weather For Spiders’, an odd title but a great tune, beginning with a simple steady driving rhythm which ultimately descended into a drum smashing frenzy while a spiralling guitar zipped around screaming for attention! One thing we noticed about Search Party tonight was not only had they become a lot tighter in their sound, but with only one guitar, they do one hell of a good impression of a band twice their size. They seem to stamp each song with a huge climatic battle royale involving all instruments creating a stronger and more confident sound. It was just a pity that the venue hadn’t yet filled as they only had a small audience to play to!

This was all about to change as the second band of the evening mounted the stage, it was The Monicans and the first thing that hits you was the fact that the bass player was a woman dressed in red, in artistic terms red is the first colour your eye picks up! Suddenly a large section of the male crowd who had previously been lounging against the bar took it upon themselves to shuffle forward, quite an amusing sight to behold it has to be said! We had reviewed a double A side release of theirs not so long ago and found it to be a complex mix of experimental punk and psychedelic folk with just a dash of metal. Taking their music out of the studio and placing slap bang in the middle of a stage really worked, as soon as they unleashed the heavy ponderous rhythm of ‘The Fool’, you knew they had something worth listening to. On guitar Paul Beard was quite dazzling as he produced effect after effect from his instrument. Rather amusingly bassist Heather Lonie nearly impaled herself on the drum kit as she tumbled backwards before the start of the second song ‘My Love’. Without doubt the best track of their set was ‘A Beacon’ which culminated in an awesomely long play out, many of these can drag on but to its credit, this was anything but boring! It’s for reasons like this that you get the impression that they deserve to play to a bigger crowd, though one thing we have to say is that it would be good if they spoke to the audience a bit....even if it was only to name a track or two. Despite that they do have an amazingly good sound, full of gifted effects, as well defined epic sounds, though we could only wonder if some of the male fans will only remember the lady in red!

If ever there was a band to follow that, it was The Tivoli, one of the best bands around, with a loyal fan base who never let them down and a sound that is genuinely bigger than any venue they’ve ever played, it will come as no surprise to find us at their gigs. They made their way onto a smoke filled stage, while singer Lee took up his command post in the centre of the stage; the rest of the band began playing the intro before going into the first track, ‘A Dear Do’. This track as with all their tracks resonates with a near militaristic power, in fact it’s almost an overbearing presence that just railroads you into submission, of course whilst some are loud, hard and pounding, even the more subtle and delicately structured tracks have almost a hypnotic effect on the listener. But for my money it is the sheer weight of relentless rhythm in songs like, ‘The Messenger’ and their final crowd pleaser ‘Common Foot Soldier’, that ultimately delivers a well earned knock out blow to the senses....of course by now you’ve already thrown in the towel to this blissful onslaught. Under the heat of the lights you could see lead singer Lee dripping buckets of sweat as he gave his all, while Russ delivered some of the best bass lines of the night, the fact that I had my ear pressed against the speaker no doubt helped...but I wasn’t complaining. Once more, a phenomenal performance from one of Sheffield’s finest bands which had they not already been standing, the crowd would easily have given them a standing ovation!

It was virtually a full house by now and with the prospect of The Violet May playing next, various members of some of Sheffield’s more prominent bands had strolled in. We interviewed The Violet May several hours prior to this gig, and at the time lead singer, Chris McClure, had a leg brace on, due to an injury he received playing football....a crunching tackle with Coldplay drummer Will Champion! With this in mind we were surprised to see him stroll on stage ‘brace-less’, he did have his traditional fag in hand smoking away. He meandered about the stage with that ‘who gives a f*ck attitude’ that has become a trademark of his gigs, in fact this continued throughout with Chris hanging himself with the microphone cable, faking a junkie shooting heroin and of course chucking everything, that wasn’t strapped down, about the stage! Noticeably he didn’t throw himself about so much....but that was no doubt due to the injury, he did in fact gingerly step down from the stage and wander off into the crowd, but always returned via the steps. All that aside I have to say that the music truly delivered tonight, as each song leapt at you, grabbed you by the scruff of the neck and throttled the sh*t out of you! With tracks like the unrelenting ‘This Crowd Is Overcrowded’ and ‘Bright Or Better’ and finishing with ‘Blood Is Not enough’. The crowd loved it, as was evident from the fact that a fair few had started dancing in front of the stage, even though it seemed to be some kind of chilled out snaking dance they performed. Of those that weren’t dancing, some lit up the odd fag and offered Chris one but he refused. This is not so much a gig, but more of an event, yes the music was great and they heap attitude on you in abundance... but love ‘em or loath ‘em, you can’t deny they have an audience willing to go along with it. We just go along with the theory that, they’re up there doing their thing and if you don’t like it don’t go, the music is great and if you can take the near arrogant charade that it comes with then you’ll be fine!

A great night for Soundclash, with a packed room and some dynamic performances from all the bands on show tonight!

Words and photos by Geoff Buckthorpe