There are times when the indie music scene confuses me. Normally this is when I go to a gig where the headline act plays some seriously good music for dancing but the crowd is far too cool to move in any way from their studied poses of indie cool distance gazing. Thus it was at Lucky Soul, as it has been at some Pipettes gigs. Get Outta Town! is the kind of song which calls for, insistantly and with some serious rhythm, for some good frugging*. I think there were perhaps a score in the crowd actually moving though, and half of them were the Swedes with Montt Mardie.

The chap bought the new Montt Mardie album and tells me it is fabulous, filling in where the live act struggled a little due to the reduced number of band members. Johnny Boy were exceptionally tight and had a powerhouse sound which really drives their songs along. I wasn't convinced by the songs' messages (pretty standard smash the system stuff) but the presentation was outstanding. Also, they ended up with a mash up of The Clapping Song ("three, six, nine, the goose drank wine") and Sheena Is a Punk Rocker.

Lucky Soul were good in almost every way (see proper photos here). Some of the more delicate songs work less well live, partially because the ambient noise of a gig disrupts the mood the songs are going for, but the band has an excellent stage presence, with good banter between songs, and the upbeat tracks are wonderful. Thankfully, like my much adored Pipettes, they are a band who don't drown the vocals in the live mix and Ali Howard's voice shouldn't be drowned. Bush Hall was a perfect venue for them, and I suspect it may remain best gig of the year for me.


*in the sense of the dance, the frug, not suspect chugger behaviour. I really need to start dancing more again.

PS: Whenever I start a new tag now, I'll be trying to retro-apply it, so if you are reading this via RSS or LJ sub then apologies for the old posts appearing. I just added lucky soul and you dancing? tags.

Labels: gigs, lucky soul, music, you dancing?