What -part 6?

GKV: I missed the acrobats. I just thought that the lights had gone on for a break, and that Amanda Palmer was just the intermission music.

EK: Hehhe... that was Dizzy Godiva & Wicked McElders - they were quite funny! Mixing comedy with actual acrobatics- mainly lifts - seemed to work for them. The audience was certainly entertained. As it was a mixed-sex couple, it would seem traditional for the man to do all the lifts, but they demonstrated that you don't need to be a man to lift another person.


GKV: Can you tell me more about Godiva and McElders? By a mixed sex couple do you mean a man and a woman? And who was doing the lifting?

EK: Er, yes, mixed sex couple was meant to indicate a man and a woman, because otherwise it felt too wordy. There goes that idea. Anyhow, she lifted him twice - he pretended not to be able to lift her at all, in this 'who is stronger' competition.

This sounds a lot like the BRB track for Subcity, doesn't it?

GKV: Yes. So acrobatics - good or bad?

EK: They were good! Really funny, and engaging. They weren't even on the stage, so their act had the immediacy of street performing in it, without the part where everyone fucks off to avoid paying.

Now what?

A woman screaming, ominous music, shadows moving about... what's going on?!

From here, it looks like one of the aliens from the Arches' basement has escaped. Yet I can't see...

Vile? Vile!

GKV: It's Calum MacAskill. I've been waiting to see this routine for  a while. He's acting out a dark ice demon fantasy, all puppetry, projection and physical potency.

I do worry about these live blogs. I hope we aren't trivialising the performances. Or not giving them enough attention. Or being too busy playing the critical clowns to drop back  into some serious moments of hardcore review action...

Eric goes solo (part 5)

Big Hogg are blasting their final piece, and Vile is off to smoke a cigarette, leaving me staring at this blank page.

Amazing how I am thinking a  million things, but they are not really relevant to the performance itself. I'm examining the audience.

The lead vocalist of Natalie Pryce sits diagonally across from me; he looks nervous. They're performing last, so I guess pressure is starting to build. Meanwhile, everybody else seems to be genuinely mesmerised by the performance. There is no reason not to be - crisp cymbals and beat, bluesy electric guitar, smooth keyboard notes, triumphant trumpet (as Vile said)... Well, they're off-stage now, saluted with the thunder of applause.

Although not full, the Stereo basement seems warm, almost intimate, despite the stage that stands at chest-height (for me... I'm not exactly tall).

I don't know quite why the live blogging is exciting. I suppose I enjoy the challenge of recording as much as possible of what I am hearing and seeing as quickly as possible, while ensuring that what I say is relatively accurate.

Now Vile is back... and the lights are on... do I want to know?

Vile goes solo... (part 4)

I usually pride myself on not taking notes when I am reviewing. So sitting in the corner using a laptop is a pretty strange experience. At least none of the really hard looking guys have come over and asked what I am doing. Especially the guitarist out of Dog Moon Howl. He looks like he could kill me with one finger.

Then again, that's probably  part of the whole rock'n'roll mythology. DMH make tough, masculine blues - for me, it shreds the vulnerability of the acoustic tradition and armours the heart against the breaking that makes the blues. Big Hogg are far more a joyous sound - I am hearing a 1973 outdoor festival between the notes, and the looser they get, the more seduced I am.

Natalie Pryce - the band are wandering around the audience, looking very sharply dressed - have created an evening where the delicacy and sensitivity of performance art meets the rough vitality of rock. I'm not sure that I can find a narrative - dear God, I'm pretentious - that resolves the tension, although McLuckie did have an abrasive edge on his more whimsical story-telling. Maybe MacAskill will give us more answers...

As for my narrative comment, I believe that an evening like The Gatsby Club would have a narrative, the acts tied together by the theme of the evening. Natalie Pryce are more interested, I think, in presenting stuff they like.