Theater A/H Spui, Den Haag
11/06/04
Indoor festivals are the future, especially those which offer plenty of bands for a good value price. Therefore The Music in My Head is a welcome experience. Although, as to why The Stands were opening up the main stage, I just don’t know. If you glance around the UK festival schedules, this band is doing pretty well across the board. I can only assume it’s due to some weird NME influence because it’s certainly not thanks to their music, which is in the style of The Byrds but loaded with predictable and dire harmonies.
Oh well, moving quickly onto zZz. It was my first time seeing this Amsterdam duo live. Considering the minor level of hype they’ve already achieved before the release of their album, including gigs in the US, it’s all kind of surprising given their basic instrumentation of drums and organ. Yet it does just about work. The drums are pounded so vehemently and the organ covers so many octaves that it does feel like a whole band is there. It’s a trippy sound too, and even although the vocals are about as tuneful as when Moby sings, all of the elements work well together.
Until this gig, Adem hadn’t quite impressed me on record, but on the night, Adem and his band provided the first pieces of incredibly gentle and pretty music. It’s a bonus that the band was full of character because despite the heavy atmosphere created during the songs, they were able to lighten the mood between numbers, and it also proved especially useful during the first few minutes, when after playing the long intro to ‘Statued’ they discovered there was no sound from a guitar. Still, it was a beautiful and aurally enriching set. Amazingly the audience remained silent throughout and it seemed unfortunate it had to end.
With only a little time to catch the end of the Gem set, it was just long enough for them to make a small impression on me. Big things are expected from this Utrecht band, and they’ve started to deliver already. Live there is less of an English rock sound, but their performance is hectic and is topped off with a weighty swagger.
It was left to Jim White to wear the alt-country baseball cap for the evening. The cap can be a curse or a gift, but to his credit, he wears it well. With a strong backing band, including a fantastic bassist, this set got stronger and stronger the longer it went on. Again, the in-between banter was really beneficial in terms of making the set more human and making the atmosphere more humorous, so it was a world away from the performances Lambchop have been providing this year.
2004 has so far been very kind to Norwegian singer-songwriter Ane Brun. After living in Stockholm for a while, her album Spending Time With Morgan has made its away across Europe and in turn she has been following suit. Her game plan seems to have worked too because this time around there was an eager crowd waiting to squeeze in and see her perform, along with the aid of a guitarist and keyboardist. And she is very good. She has the songs, she has the voice, and she has the style. I just can’t escape the thought that there is some X-Factor missing, because as good as she is, I always expect something just a little bit better. It’s possibly that she sometimes sways towards the safer, commercial grounds rather than taking the risks and proving to be something more unique. Still, it was an enjoyable performance.
With the venue full, it was tempting to avoid the Sun Kil Moon set happening in the foyer, which earlier on had been the most hectic area. So as I wandered out, it was shocking to find only about 50 patrons taking in the music of Mark Kozelek, particularly since Ghosts of the Great Highway has been so positively received this year. Yet here was this legendary name playing to an almost empty room.
With three guitarists lined up in a row (including Kozelek), and then a violist and violinist to the right of the stage, they produced an incredibly pretty sound, with notes chiming and ringing out intricately. However, without the aid of drums, which play such a key role on the album, the songs seemed to fall into a plod, and it was quickly more reminiscent of the Red House Painters sound than Sun Kil Moon. Especially with Kozelek singing almost a foot behind his microphone with about three additional reverb units on top of that, making the voice seem so distant from the rest of the music. It was also a slightly tense affair on stage with a lot of shoe-gazing from everyone, but their music is good, just very different from the recordings.
And then after a prolonged gap filled with worried looking technicians, PJ Harvey was out to steal the night in what was definitely the most brutal performance of not only the evening, but of anything I’ve witnessed all year. Her live show has altered so much since the Stories From the City… tours of 2000 and 2001. Back then there was a happy balance of the poppier new material and the older stuff like ‘Rid of Me’. This time, with a stripped down 4-piece band, it was a case of raw, raw, and rawer, of what was an intensely ferocious set dominated by new material from Uh Huh Her, as well as songs from the darkest, scariest corners of her career.
Yet it was so much fun. There was so much energy being pounded out of the stage, and with half the audience dying in the heat, it just continued to get harder and faster. Guitarist Josh Klinghoffer, more commonly found playing and writing with John Frusciante was a whirring ball of hair firing out wiry guitar riffs. When he wasn’t doing that he was playing drums, sometimes at the same time as the original drummer, leaving a mammoth fuzz bass to take the attention.
It’s hard to comprehend what’s caused this latest twist in Harvey’s career, but it’s not only fascinating, it’s exciting. Almost everything remotely radio-friendly was bypassed for something confrontational. In fact, the version of ‘Taut’ that normally lies hidden on the Dance Hall at Louse Point album was simply one of the most evil performances I’ve ever witnessed, producing so much sonic chaos. And of course Harvey’s voice still rules any arena effortlessly. She can be prancing, leaping, or playing guitar and nothing seems to make her miss a breath. It was definitely the darkest show of the year, but also the most exhilarating.
And just when nothing could possibly follow that volume and madness, there was Ella Guru playing gently away outside. This Liverpool band are signed to Rough Trade, although, their debut record is not quite released yet, and with a wide range of instrumentation at their disposal, they play some very peaceful indie-pop. Well, perhaps anything would be peaceful after PJ Harvey, but still, Ella Guru provided a lulling farewell to a manic night.
Steven McCarron
Photo: 3voor12 Den Haag
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