Out Of Spite

Just Norris/Uncle Frank @ The Firebug, Leicester 9/08
Out Of Spite X @ Joesph's Well, Leeds 10/8 & 11/8
War Crimes/Big Difference/Power Corrupts/Army Of Flying Robots @ The Cricketer's Arms, Sheffield 13/08


The punk all dayer reminds me of being young, of turning up at some crappy venue at 2 in the afternoon to find out the band you really wanted to see and came early for have canceled. This weekend saw the the very last Out Of Spite, so I though I'd make the effort. Plus there was some band called Spy Versus Spy playing a reunion set.
After one of the worst train journey's ever (1 hour and 15 minutes to get to Leeds? Ridiculous), I get to Joesph's Well in time for Joe Ninety who set the trend for the weekend by A) being a punk rock band in the vein of Jawbreaker/Hot Water Music and B) having recently got back together. Another trend for the weekend was the finger point. There's something to be said about seeing a crowd all singing along with their fingers in the air. Dartz! played next, during their set another theme of the weekend came to light - Joesph's Well gets unbearably hot. I don't think I've been to a gig where I've sweated that much in years. And that includes gigs I've played (those stage lights get awfully hot). Over the two days I think I lost about 2 stone in weight; it was like a sauna. I digress. Back on the reunion tip were And None Of Them Knew They Robots. Having been at their original last ever gig I can say that the 3 year gap spent playing in Send More Paramedics may have a lasting affect on their guitarist - most of the set was spent doing metal poses and sticking his tongue out. Despite (or in spite of) the metal shapes, The Robots were pretty fucking good. I do wonder if Kev, singer of band, found himself cringing when he had to relearn some of the lyrics. Particularly the line "I wish I was six again and sitting next to David". On the other hand I've never heard a band make a hook out of screaming my name. Not my full name obviously; that would be stupid.
And so comes the one of the most anticipated bands of the weekend - the newly back together Spy Versus Spy. Considered by many to be one of the best British bands of the last ten years, and rightly so, it's a simple greeting of "welcome to the late 90s" that they open their set, launching straight into a rousing rendition of "Waiting For Centralia To Sink". Fingers are pointed, drums scatter about, guitars play angular one note riffs and a crowd sing a long starts. Some of the songs are re-arranged, probably down to the fact that they're missing one of their original guitarists, they couldn't find him apparently, and whilst not all of the new renditions work brilliantly, the songs still as good as they did in 1997. Finishing with an amazing version of "Union Station Still", they're done.

The second day of Out Of Spite features lots of bands that fall into the gruff punk rock category. So I shall do one word reviews because I'm lazy and can only think of one way to say "they sound a bit like Jawbreaker or Hot Water Music". So here we go. The Great St Louis weren't too good; Chillerton were probably the best band of the day, good hooks and well worth checking out; The Leif Ericsson were fairly average; Southport looked fairly old and again weren't up to much; The Dauntless Elite were surprisingly good, lots of good dual vocals and some almost melodic hardcore bits; Milloy get the award for worst band name of the weekend and whilst they were pretty good, I can't bring myself to like a band with such a bad name. The other thing I learnt this weekend was that if the crowd sings along and does lots of finger pointing, it makes a band seem a whole better.

In other gig news, Redcars played their second last gig on thursday. I thought we were pretty good, if a bit sloppy in places. No one seemed to notice the missing keyboard, including us, and I stood on the bar. Army Of Flying Robots were nice and thrashy and Big Difference (I think) played a hardcore version of 2Unlimited's "No Limit".

I wanted to post some Spy Versus Spy mp3s but all the stuff on my computer is coded for iTunes. So no music, unless anyone requests some. Go on, I dare you.