Cambridge Zombiegeddon

Not only was Warp Riders a breakaway album for The Sword in terms of their musical style, but the sci-fi narrative within the album itself looked inwardly at the band capturing the stresses of their biggest and longest tour to date. Cabin fever seemed to spill over during the original opening tour dates to this album, and these stresses resulted in the departure of drummer Trivett Wingo. He has since said that there could be a time that he will return to the band, but not for a few years. Previously to Wingo’s departure, The Sword played a different gig in London at The Barfly, and oddly enough, current tour support Gentlemans Pistols were a part of that earlier bill. Many of those in attendance for tonight’s event may well have found themselves wondering if perhaps The Sword should have chosen someone else.

Turbogeist (1/5) are a strange bunch of lads, and tonight it doesn’t seem like they are having such a good time. Throughout their set they battle with annoying feedback, malfunctioning amps, and broken guitars: “everything about today has been shambolic” notes guitarist Jimmy Jagger. His laid-back, self-deprecating swagger ironically injects confidence into the band, who perform a mix of 70s rock and 80s punk with a pop twist. Sing-a-long choruses adorn a thick sounding 3-guitar onslaught, yet some of the finer moments of tracks such as “Song For North Korea” are lost within the manic and sometimes loose delivery. On the whole, their performance was rather lacklustre, despite some cheers from the crowd.

Gentlemans Pistols (4/5) however, are anything but lacklustre. Beaming with charisma and consistent retro flamboyancy, the four-piece from Leeds take to the stage with bassist Douglas McLaughlan sipping a heavy dose of what looks like Tia Maria. In their own words they “are a rock band who play rock music”, and it is a simple as that. What sets them apart from bands such as Firebird – whose guitarist Bill Steer also plays in Gentlemans Pistols – is the overall stage presence. These guys just want to party and jam out those rock licks in a sexy-swing-time kind of way. Countless times through the set, guitarist James Atkinson would set about trying to seduce his other band mates, joining them for a quick bit of banter in between verses. The band are just about to release their latest album At Her Majesty’s Pleasure, so the crowd are provided the opportunity to hear some of the new material live in the form of “Some Girls Don’t Know What’s Good For Them” and “Sherman Tank”, with the latter’s hypnotic and long-winding riff dominating the track. It isn’t surprising The Sword invited these guys back – by about a third of the way through their set it is clear that The Sword and Gentlemans Pistols probably have a lot of musical influences in common, and the Pistols‘ set hints at the lighter moments of Warp Riders. They have all the tones and stage presence of yesteryear’s equally bell-bottomed bands, and could well be Leeds’ possible answer to, well The Answer.

I honestly wondered if the recent difficulties within The Sword (4/5) would be evident from the band’s on-stage performance. Tonight’s gig is the last date of the rescheduled Euro tour which should have happened back in December, and it wouldn’t be surprising if the band were looking tired or even slightly relieved that it was all over. Well, to look at guitarist Kyle Shutt performing, you would think that this was the first leg of that tour. I don’t recall J.D Cronise ever being too extroverted whilst onstage. He is a more methodical guitarist, delivering the riffs for Shutt’s solos – a bit like the Hetfield/Hammett partnership if you will. But Shutt seems to be ready for anything as he hammers out the solos during the set.

It seems at first as if the band are going to treat the audience to the whole ofWarp Riders, as they immediately played the first three tracks from the album. But instead the set mostly consisted of a combination of cuts from Warp Ridersand the band’s full-length debut, Age Of Winters. Of course, one of the biggest cheers on the night occurred during “Freya” – the track that first introduced many of the people here to the band in the first place, as it did for myself. Without doubt the tracks that work the best are from those two albums, with only “How Heavy This Axe” and “To Take the Black” working their way into the setlist from Gods Of The Earth. It is an almost faultless set, full of precision riffs and duelling solos, and the crowd are eager to shout their appreciation. In hindsight, it is plain to see why the band chose to change direction, and it seems to be working well for them right now.

[Originally published on Onemetal]

Photoset from Orange Goblin @ Junction

Last month rockers in Cambridge were spoilt rotten by the appearance of Black Label Society at the Corn Exchange. To be fair, this city does get its fair share of hard rock, but it isn’t often you get bands who aren’t Saxon or Motorhead. Three months ago Orange Goblin were celebrating their 15th anniversary at their annual shindig in London, and here we are in March with what could be the the remnants of last years celebrations or a sneak peek at the rumoured new material.

Cambridge’s Unit Nine (2.5/5) were on too early for me to really catch their whole set of uptempo Down influenced hard rock. The 5-piece concentrate too much on making sure they hit all the rights notes that there is little interaction between them and the audience, which inevitably make the small crowd thin out and start chatting amongst themselves. “Just because you are here for the other bands, doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy yourselves” shouts singer Matt Redgrave at the end of track “I Fall”, challenging the crowd for a bit of feedback. In their favour, Unit Nine have much more in common with the headliners than the band that would come onstage next.

Imicus (1/5) take the stage to a crowd that is still pretty small for such a large room. The band, who were one of OneMetal’s “6 upcoming metal bands to watch in 2010”, aren’t one of the ones to watch in 2011 if you judge them by this performance. Although they have played at the Bulldog Bash, I am struggling to find a reason why they should be alongside the beer and biker rock that this evening is about. Surrounded by strong contrasting spot lights and moments of near darkness, during the first couple of songs of “An Isolation Dawn” and “Inevigle” the crowd were finding it hard to actually hear singer Miller’s vocals — something that hampered Unit Nine’s set before. The drums were also too high in the mix, with incredible levels for the drums smashing the rest of the band into the shadows. Imicus, who have been on the road with INME, did win over a handful of people with their nu(ish)-metal and atmospherics, with an emotional lyrical content all envisaged by a near glossy persona. But sadly, by the last couple of songs which included “Butterfly” and “Veiled Ogdema” it felt more filler than killer.

Black Sabbath loving, trucker cap donning Viking Skull (4/5) sure know how to give the crowd what they want. The band power their way through “Born In Hell” and “Wizards Sleeve” with their thick Gibson powered over-driven tone from the guitar duo of Dom Wallace and Frank Regan. They even manage to whip in a few bars of Sabbath’s “Iron Man” at the end of “Wizards Sleeve”. Their set mostly consists of tracks from the recent Heavy Metal Thunder album, which in itself is a sort of “best-of” compilation of tracks from their first couple of releases. It doesn’t matter though, as this is the sort of band brimming with self-confidence and bravado honed from small sweaty shows over the years. Viking Skull live up their alcohol fuelled doom-rock with beer being thrown from the crowd andOrange Goblin’s Ben Ward bringing on stage a massive tray of Jägermeister for the band to enjoy. Big guitars and big amps propel the band to near deafening levels throughout “Red Hot Woman” and “In Hell” — but nowhere as near as loud as when Airbourne graced the same stage a couple of years ago. Viking Skull are a very good band to a enjoy a few beers to.

The self-proclaimed “beer-core” four-piece bring in both more of a balanced look and sound for the crowd at the venue, with gigantic vocalist Ben Ward spending time egging on the crowd and launching himself towards them whenever possible. Orange Goblin’s (4/5) 16-year history has on the one hand always been about heavy blues rock, but within their six studio albums they have explored different areas of heaviness, from the straight forward stoner/doom ofFrequencies From Planet Ten, the more psychedelic Time Travelling Blues, the more mature and dazy sounding Coup De Grace to Thieving From The House Of God — the latter which Ward has described it as a combination of all the band’s previous work. Essentially this reflects the kind of set presented tonight. Despite bassist Martyn Millard looking subdued, he gets lost in his bass work, swaying along and playing in a stance reminiscent of Kyuss’ Scott Reeder and Shrinebuilder’s Al Cinerous. It’s strong playing and complements guitarist Joe Hoare’s sweet sounding blues guitar. The songs that stand out in their performance seem to be more from Thieving From The House of God and the well loved The Big Black. Maybe it’s because “Alcofuel”, “Cozmo Bozo”, “Hard Luck”, “Quincy the Pigboy“, and the emphatic “Some You Win, Some You Lose” all seem to work better live and the crowd can full appreciate some of the finer moments in the bands songwriting over the years.

[Review first appeared on OneMetal]

(Source: petapixel.com)