Granted it's off our usual patch, but considering this is the closest Nottingham's electro pioneers stop to our fine city on this stretch of their UK outings, it's a fine enough excuse to stump up for a round-trip to our erstwhile Midlands neighbours. It also gives us the chance to spend the night in possibly the nicest venue in which we've ever set foot, Victoria Street's stunning mock-Victorian 'Royal'. Chandeliered to the hilt, it's certainly a step up from some of the gritty dives we're used to (not that we're complaining about our standard venue...) yet whether it'll have the almost sterile nature of grand venues of its ilk - De Montfort, we're looking at you - remained to be seen as we unwrapped and settled in for the first of tonight's three acts.
Fatboy Slim collaborator, Liam Finn songwriter... is there any end to Connan 'Mockasin' Hosford's seemingly endless talents? Well, yes actually. See, while his mock-Japanese sea shanties and Deerhoof-plagiarising nonsense ditties might seem pleasantly refreshing enough, his seeming inability to pull together any sort of cohesive performance has him, come the end of his set, regress into stop-start wankery on his electric zither and incessant testosterone-defying squealling, like Clinic on a helium and sugar high. Beneath the ADHD haze of impatient kack-handed strumming, there is, rather irritatingly, much to enjoy; 'Egon Hosford' is the bastard child of The Crystals and Ennio Morricone, while 'Macheeky' descends from jazz-club 'Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots' to a static-heavy Liars. Ultimately, it's a far more exciting prospect on record than stage, something which resounds throughout Hosford's missed opportunity of a set.
The opener's muso half-hour is soon recovered, however, with the entrance of Mica Levi and backing band the Shapes. Micachu's fast become a reference point for London's E3 area and the grime-indie ('grindie', for the NME readers among us) crossover it's birthed, and her swift rise - marked by the recent delay of debut album 'Jewellery' after her Rough Trade signing - is tonight marked by a trademark set of genre-blurring hip-hop, electro and folk. '4 Eat Your Heart' elicits tonight's first singalong while past singles 'Curly Teeth' and 'Golden Phone' are rough and ready highlights. Her best aspect, the DIY percussion she enlists, is evident throughout; while Levi flits from ukelele to electric guitar and back, keyboardist Raisa Khan unceromoniously bashes wine bottles and cowbells as accompaniment to drummer Marc Pell's understated tribal polyrhythms. What it lacks in stand-outs, it more than makes up for in subtlety and Levi's parting words - "We'll see you soon" - will doubtless be prophetic, on a far wider scale, come the release of her debut next month.
Talking of debuts, Late of the Pier's 'Fantasy Black Channel' was, for us here at TC Towers at least, the pinnacle of 2008 music. A snotty-nosed, sprawling teen effort, it garnered widespread acclaim, five singles and hoardes of supporters the world over, while managing to be the only album all year us impatient sorts could actually listen to the whole way through, probably thanks to the fact that it condensed a fidgety genre-melding of almost Soulwax proportions into a half-hour of sweaty, emotional, wide-eyed fun. Live too, they've always managed to live up to their billing; you might remember November's cramped Sausage Party love-in at the Chameleon, and how, so destructive was their trademark apocalyptic techno-disco, it threatened to make the first-floor venue collapse. Tonight's no exception and from the thumping bass notes of opener 'Space and the Woods' and its arpeggiated live intro to the 'Great Gig on the Sky' vocal gymnastics of 'Bathroom Gurgle', it's a masterclass in fiery electro-punk. Beset by technical problems, especially during 'Random Firl' and 'Broken' - which, tonight at least, ought be renamed 'Broken Guitar' considering the efforts Sam Eastgate's hapless techie has to go to get his unresponsive axe going again - it's an ill-tempered atmosphere onstage, yet one which is channelled into the brutal likes of 'Focker' to tear the sticky dancefloor apart, further proof of their ever-developing maturity. Every track gets the welcome bands with triple their back catalogue would expect; 'VW', for one, has become the terrace chant of the nu-rave generation, while 'The Enemy Are The Future' collapses into a space-funk Can wig-out reminscent of first album LCD Soundsystem. In the end, it's dance/rock/punk/electro of the highest order and while they can get away with it, their genre-straddling magnificence is fine by us.
Late of the Pier played:
- Space and the Woods
- Heartbeat
- Random Firl
- Broken
- Whitesnake
- VW
- The Bears Are Coming
- The Enemy Are The Future
- Focker
- Bathroom Gurgle
www.myspace.com/lateofthepier
www.myspace.com/micayomusic
www.myspace.com/connanmockasin
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