No Pain In Pop

New Totems, Rituals

Sunday night was a rare one. !!!No Shows Forever!!! inched tentatively into the tepid, sulky light of Deptford to make its debut play and won so emphatically. Around 160 copped legion bangs, broken glass and four of the city’s finest; PENS, who you should know about already, as you should Banjo or Freakout, Gentle Friendly, Ponytail and (imminently at least, at last) Graffiti Island. A review of sorts lurks after ‘the jump’.

MP3: Graffiti Island - Head Hunters

PENS, Graffiti Island, Banjo or Freakout, Gentle Friendly w/Ponytail
@ The Crown and Sceptre, London SE8
(!!!No Shows Forever!!!)

(Photos)

Notable by their absence were the usual London mopes. Like I said, it was a rare one – a chance to go out in this city and relax among faces that weren’t slumping competitive to be the saddest in the room.

You’re probably still listening to ‘Head Hunters’, but with the interests of future archivists in mind it’s better to start as the night did with PENS. ‘Hate Your Calendar’ was an early amp test, guitars screeched sore like brats turfing phlegm from a red throat. The noise was pretty awkward for a while, aided by instruments that took forever to tune, but then came the ode to the slasher (‘Freddie’), a cover of The Gun Club’s ‘Sex Beat’, ‘Networking’ and a few songs I don’t know the names of yet, all of which ripped through the skin of feedback to present PENS own fizzing guts to the gathered. Amelia, Stefania and Helen left the stage after 20 minutes, their guitars, keys and drums about five before that. A rad shambles, handclaps, howling.

Slipping away from regular routines, Banjo or Freakout pretty much killed it tonight. Since being joined on the regular by Dan of Gentle Friendly/Buttonhead Alessio Natalizia’s drone dreams seems to have filled out into a noisescape vast and lush, momentarily overcast but punctured every so often by splintered bursts of voice that come to refresh and lead like light through cloud. A mind hard wined by this stage struggles to recall the specifics, instead carrying the impression of bruising – of snare skins, from guitar strings, of ears and arms in the bustle triumphant.

One can only speculate as to the thoughts that distract Graffiti Island’s Pete Dee on his wanders through the everyday. There seems to be a preoccupation with freaks. Lyrics are young myths that tell of those suffering from congenial general Hypertrichosis, cursed weremen covered in hair; of cannibals “sipping hot cocoa from a human skull” and serenely whittling pipes from pinky fingers; of demonic cats with six hundred sixty six lives (more at Voodoo Village, Dee’s ‘blog).

‘Head Hunters’ is typical Graffiti Island and is played out tonight – bass and drum rumble, lurch, Dee’s brains spilling out past his teeth, mind’s eye honing in on the freaks. It works ‘cause the sound’s stark and arch. An imagination your mother would sweetly call “sick” floods the gaps between one beat and the next, bass or guitar lines there to lend and lead simple but potent melodies; surf-punk macabre.

Gentle Friendly will come to clinch the evening win with a set similar to Banjo’s in its improv glee, only ever emphasised by the joining of Ponytail’s Molly Siegel, a presence conducting the rapture. Room held out for this, whooping now regular, wolf cries howled out. Later the police will drop by and windows will burst with the noise struggling to escape from The Crown and Sceptre, into that sulky Deptford light put to bed with the last night of summer. New brats, new beats; new totems, rituals.

Tags: banjo or freakout, gentle friendly, graffiti island, no shows forever, pens

2 Comments to New Totems, Rituals

1. 

   rad!
king on September 24th, 2008
2. 

   BOOM!!!!!!
rachael on September 25th, 2008

Leave a comment