Feb 09

Jordan Reyne + Jack Harris @ The Hare & Hounds, Birmingham, UK – 9th February 2012

Jordan Reyne Now what we had here was a Folk Club situation. No! Don’t run away just yet. It was a small venue setting big on surprises. Jack Harris is from a sleepy, one-sheep town in rural mid-Wales. Whilst the fiery-maned, smouldering Pre-Raphaelite tressed antipodian Circe of pedal effect sonic enchantment, Jordan Reyne, hails from New Zealand. And between them both they gave us kaleidoscopic interpretations of traditional Folk, experimental multi-loop Steampunk and all thing in between and then some. Do keep up!


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Feb 02

Joanna Briggs + Tara Chinn + Robert Lane + Valerie Vegas @ The Hare & Hounds, Birmingham, UK – 2nd February 2012

Joanna Briggs Joanna Briggs - hmm! Her fish-net suspender stockings, kitsch cute bell-boy hat and double-buttoned breath-defying basque had me thinking Peter Gabriel and Prince, with the latter at his most disgustingly sublime erotomanic best. Her impossibly Michelangelo sculptured shoulders and mouth of Hades mascaraed eyes are an intoxicating incantation of desire. The alt. dominatrix danger Babe stage persona, bathed in ersatz Lucozade laser light and backed by a slut-bucket brutal cool band are a fearful delight. But, at the same time, there’s a seductive venerability. Imagine Debbie Harry and Captain Beefheart stroking a hungry tigress. At this gig your imagination was allowed to run wild. Feral fun for grown-up children.


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Jan 27

The Maccabees + Trailer Trash Tracys @ The HMV Institute, Birmingham, UK – 27 January 2012

The Maccabees The Maccabees undoubted panache for celestial teen-angst agendas pureed in swathes of cathedral histrionics, basking in the ghost-light of Tate Modernesque backdrops and Radiohead/Soft Cell James Joyce dreams of sub-consciousness had to be forsaken. And they continued to get ever better Tweets tell. A sublimely good-natured, capacity Institute crowd were clearly convinced. Many thanks to Susie & Morad for review passes.


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Jan 25

The Magic Tombolinos @ The Hare and Hounds from World Unlimited Promotions, Birmingham, UK – 25 January 2012

The Magic Tombolinos Ensemble troubadours, The Magic Tombolinos*, led by founder, vocals and stax of sax, Alejandro Toledo, brought their celebratory eclectic mongrel mash up genre-busting, idiom defying music to The Hare this evening. And what fun it was and full on credit to promoters, ‘World Unlimited’ for their ever valiant, non-profit making ethos of lending deserved support for all manner of diverse artists.


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Sep 18

Gary Numan + Jayce Lewis @ Wulfrun Hall, Wolverhampton, UK – 18 September 2011

Gary Numan Long ago, in times of innocent, analogue angst, electro-punk dystopian dynamo, Gary Numan, Tube Way Army’s alter-ego frontman, debuted on Top Of The Pops, 1979 with ‘Are Friends Electric’ and soon following with ‘Cars’. His Alice Cooper/Klaus Kinsky Nosferatu hybrid mascara looks and disembodied stage anti-presence both polarised and mesmerised in equal measure.


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Dec 15

The Pretty Reckless + Francesqa @ The Wulfrun, Wolverhampton, UK – 15 December 2010

The Pretty Reckless Originally called The Reckless, disputes over previous claims on the name led to the added prefix. Now, one may speculate why they chose that particular adjective. Does it incite a sense wild, but ironic abandon? Or perhaps, given American alt. Rock’s preference for the single entendre, it refers to seventeen year old, founder member, Taylor Momsen’s, undoubtedly appealing looks. Actress, model and burgeoning rock-chick role-model, the audience are in awe.


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Dec 13

Rumer + Phantom Limb @ The Glee Club, Birmingham, UK – 13 December 2010

Rumer Imagine, just imagine, that The Graces of poetry and music summoned the likes of The Carpenters, Carole King, Julie London, Dusty Springfield, Bert Bacharch, Mary Coughlan and Herb Albert and asked them to kiss some of their magical muse upon this unassuming, singularly charismatic young lady, (BB already has) Sarah Joyce, who goes by the professional persona of Rumer (after a poet). She records an album; lovers go all moonstruck, kittens and puppies are sighed at in pet shops and your what to get you know who Christmas present dilemma is solved. Of Anglo/Pakistani descent and a history worthy of a tale she’s no overnight success but has worked doggedly these past six years to gain her deserved recognition.


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Nov 24

Wolf Gang + Malpas @ The Hare & Hounds, Birmingham, UK – 24 November 2010

Wolf Gang Wolf Gang, aka Max McElligott, and collective fine musicians has created his own engaging, idiosyncratic style, which, in this reviewer’s opinion, draws on some of the 1980s more noble attributes such as Howard Jones and Simple Minds. Some hear homage to Davids Byrne/Bowie. Not a derivative comparison but just little tingles of nostalgia and again, this is my impression, a tickle of Arcade Fire’s majestic harmonies and crescendos.


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