the black lips: the bucky rage: barrowlands: glasgow

god the heat, that evil heat, seeping bonewards, sapping strength and character with the grim inevitability of christmas.  i’ll keep it short and sweet; that strange bill, those creeping three hours, the unsettling feeling deep down in guts and blood. 

first there was a band, some youngbloods whose intentions were set out in hair.  they’d read the big book of stodgy mid-nineties brit rock.  read it and rewrote it exactly the same just without joined up writing and the sense of ugly purpose.  they were all weller and gallacher and brown.  like a slick karaoke of second hand second hand influences.  they even sang a song about changing the world.  possibly.  the future.  the future is a boot stamping on a human face.  forever.  which is a damned sight preferable to those daft fucking sideburns and cocksure swagger.  are the kids really doing this these days?

third there was a band, some slightylessyoungbloods whose intentions were also set out in hair.   they’d read the big book of slick american nu-ass-rock.  read it and got their stylist to rework it with sponsorship by ghd straighteners.  they were all lostprophets by way of topshop.  like the mighty boosh but not funny.  i’ll be all over you like a nun sandwich.  with three proper blokes on bass guitar drums and two caricatures being all motley crue and shit.  they sang a song about how fucked the kids were in this world.  possibly.  the future.  the future is a converse shoe lightly flicking a hairdressers ankle.  for five minutes.  somebody smacked the singer with a pint.  idiots – both the pinter and the pintee.  are the kids really buying this fakery these days?

then; a random rumble.  you touched my beer.  you spilled my bird.  you look all tight and shiny and i’d like to homoerotically wrestle you about a sweat soaked rubber floor.  at first resembling a two man mosh pit before realisation dawned that two fellas were attempting to knock lumps out of each other.  one guys watch flew off and landed at the feet of one of our party.  she handed it to the soundman so if it was your watch tyson that’s who’s got it.  an appeal from the hair on stage to calm down was (in)appropriate and humorous.  delusions; headlining the farcical new woodstock and a limp bizkit-esque riot going on.  not a brief punch up.  still it kept me amused.  oh and there was a bouncer manning the polite queue at the bar (a fucking queueing system!) and one to prevent people sitting on each other shoulders.  but some roughhousing in the middle of the room?  not a bouncer to be seen.

second there was a band.  those masked bastards the bucky rage.  again.  everywhere i turn there’s a kabuki mask or bandana.  resplendent and imperious with their camouflage kilts and goddam golden anonymity.  i heard one of them’s on the run from cobb county georgia.  i heard one of them’s a wellhung manwhore.  i heard one of them killed a man for touching his stetson.  i heard one of them’s chuck norris.  you heard right son.  they’re all those things and so much more.  you know that feeling when you turn out the lights and you think there’s someone behind you?  well there is, and it’s the bucky rage with fists full of hate and a psychokiller go-go dancer in tow.  how good are they?  well they play link wray’s rumble.  if that don’t tell you all you need to know then you don’t know shit.  so crawl away and die moron.  tonight those good ol’ boys are on fire.  not literally.  although i did suggest some flame based cabaret to get the crowd going.  in the end there were no need for lighter fluid and matches coz the show was so goddamned hellfire hot my crackpipe melted, my meths evaporated and my masacara ran like a whupped dog.  hell yes.  songs about girls and wrestling and freaks and sometimes all three together with big ass electric solos, frenzied jungle drums from a man who looks like if freddie krueger was a worm and a bass sound slicker than a texan dancing girls greasy pole.  and like the blaggards they are, came quickly and left us feeling soiled.  hot damn!

everyone loves a cocksucker.  so the main act, the big cheeses, those enfant terribles of dirty garage rock, those grimy pissing spewing young upstarts the black lips.  it’s best not to believe the shit you read in the press.  there were no fluids (sweat excepted).  there were no fights (earlier wrasslin’ excepted).  what there was was a shitload of lo-fi garage (and it’s not some garage rock revivalist thing) and rock and roll played with a rattling ramshackledness and fucked up but not totally fucked charm.  imagine the rolling stones exile on main street played by punk kids with junk shop electrics.  imagine the sonics but as young men with metal fucking teeth.  imagine the mummies with the most glorious victorian gentlemans mustache.  occasionally psychedelic, swampy and in amongst the noise and hissing and buzzing and missed chords and frantic thrash there’s some big bloody tunes for singing and dancing and fucking and drinking to.  sure it’s grimy occasionally but it’s played with heart and balls and sweat and tears.  as far as i can remember following a weekends exertions and a few beers beforehand they play a lot off the grand new(ish) record good bad not evil, which is a lot less of a wonderfully semi-unhinged mess than previous records, occasionally bordering on wonderfully skewed skuzzy pop.  i heard bad kids’ ode to well being an bratty little bad kid, katrina sounding like a drunk version of seven nation army played all wrong but just right and ah so many tunes go clattering past it’s hard to keep track.  tthe whole gig feels as if it’s teetering on the brink of collapse and just before they run out of momentum and we get bored by their simple(ish) squall they pack up and bugger off.  top drawer stuff.  although i like to keep all the good shit in the bottom drawer.  

oh and the dude with metal teeth on guitar, how he was able to stand up no matter bang out those chords i don’t bloody know.

juvenile:

they’re still on tour:

• 6th may sheffield the plug
• 7th may leeds brudenell social club
• 8th may birmingham club nme at the place i love
• 9th may cambersands all tomorrow’s parties versus pitchfork
• 11th may cambridge the junction
• 12th may oxford academy
• 13th may bristol thekla
• 14th may london 100 club      

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