Issue 3 / August 2010

42
Bido Lito! August 2010
Reviews
into the world of stand-up comedy.
Certainly no laughing stock playing
live, the band overcame the faux pas
of insulting a Liverpudlian crowd early
on in their set, leaving the audience
thoroughly warmed up for the
illustrious headline act.
“You’re that punk that I’ve been
waiting for. You’re it.” Here’s what
we’ve all been waiting for; the prodigal
son of, ahem, broken Britain strolls
on to the darkened stage during
the intriguing sample to set opener
The Man’s Machine. JAMIE T & THE
PACEMAKERS burst into song while
the ecstatic crowd simultaneously
does likewise. Tearing through a
fifteen song strong set, incorporating
a greatest hits setlist, old favourites
Back In The Game and If You Got The
Money have the crowd singing along
word for word while newer material
such as Earth, Wind & Fire sees the
Wimbledon-born Jamie Treays literally
bounce around the stage, covering
ground with such exuberance it’s a
wonder his skinny, laddish frame (now
sporting a rather fetching ‘tache) didn’t
topple over. His band The Pacemakers
put on an equally impressive show;
guitarist Luis Felber is on the floor
playing with his pearly whites while
bassist James Dunston is possibly the
coolest person I have ever seen in my
life, simply plucking away at his bass
without a care in the world.
Between songs Jamie T gives
Liverpool a special shout out, crediting
our local music scene, mentioning
artists like Hot Club de Paris and
Sound of Guns, encouraging his
audience to “get involved because
there are some fucking good bands
about.” A man after our own hearts.
Ending with British Intelligence, a
boisterous affair which with snarling,
topical lyric “taxed by a man that I’m
yet to meet” gets a rowdy reception,
his observational wordsmithery being
entirely relevant to recent budget
revelations. The band then walk off
stage, soon to return for their highly
anticipated four-song encore starting
with Spider’s Web. As lone guitarist
Felber sits in the far corner of the
stage, ukulele in tow, he prompts
the audience to sing the backing
vocals until Jamie T and the rest of
his Pacemakers make an appearance.
Before concluding for good with the
coveted Sticks ‘n’ Stones, Jamie T gives
a heartrending speech, “I’d just like to
say there are a lot of mean people out
there, remember that so we all gotta
be nice to each other ... We gotta look
after each other and not be fucking
arseholes to each other.” There are
some things that only troubadour
Jamie T can say and still sound so
poignant and charming: that was one
of them.
Bethany Garrett
RODRIGO Y GABRIELA
Wallis Bird
O2 Academy
WALLIS BIRD, an Irish soundalike
of KT Tunstall, is onstage bashing
the life out of an acoustic guitar. As
Pete Townshend learned early on in
his career, the harder you smash the
guitar the more audiences seem to
appreciate it, and so it goes here. The
majority of her set sees her dealing out
a guitar-mangling worthy of Thurston
Moore. After so many worthy singersongwriters
gently plucking acoustic
guitars it is refreshing to encounter
one who plays with so much
conviction that the set could possibly
have gone ahead minus amplification.
With songs ‘mostly about riding
somebody’ as she self-deprecatingly
puts it, the majority most of the lyrics
bear this out, including one track with
the key line, ‘I would do time for just
one more kiss’. After half an hour’s
worth of frantic guitar scrubbing she
exits the stage, presumably for a lie
down.
RODRIGO Y GABRIELA take to the
stage at the relatively early hour of
9pm following a deluge of vintage
metal played over the PA.
A pair
of dyed-in-the-wool metallers who
relocated to Dublin, the duo busked
Metallica and Slayer songs on the
street where passers-by mistook their
material for flamenco. The presence
of so many metal T-shirts is slightly
incongruous to begin with, yet
begins to makes sense as the kinship
between the duo’s material and tracks
like Metallica’s One are clear.
The bulk of the set is drawn from
new LP 11:11, the first to be selfcomposed
by the twosome. The only
gig I’ve attended where the playing of
acoustic guitars leads to an outbreak
of pogoing and people throwing devil
signs, Gabriela effectively provides
the rhythm section, her thumps
to her nylon strung guitar as loud
as any bass drum. While Gabriela
effectively lays the foundation of
the tracks, Rodrigo builds on this
with the melody lines that fit over
the top of it. As songwriters, the pair
don’t quite match the virtuoso skill
they display as musicians, preferring
rhythm, tone and texture to anthemic
choruses. When the playing is as good
as this however, such reservations are
academic. Taking turns at short solo
spots, even on their own each guitarist
is mesmerising. Gabriela’s frantic
chord vamping supplemented with
percussive slaps to the guitar makes
you wonder how so much sound can
come from one instrument. With the
addition of a few more FX pedals, and
Lars Ulrich behind the drumkit, much
of tonight’s set could pass for vintage
Metallica.
The string shredding solos the
duo mete out are the equal of Matt
Bellamy’s work in Muse, arguably
even more impressive, having to rely
on the actual guitar itself to provide
the effects, not FX units or synapse
twisting amplification. Indeed, some
of the quieter moments of the set
are so tranquil the thrum of the air
conditioning unit can be heard above
it. When they do utilise stomp boxes
however, as on the Hendrix-aping
Buster Voodoo, the effect is stunning.
One of their keynote tracks, the song
is played following a brief diversion
Rodrigo Y Gabriela (John Johnson)
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