Last night's gig was

Checks out.

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A few days ago now but I forgot to post about it at the weekend. Went to The Great Eastern Festival in Edinburgh this Saturday. Lots of local acts and a few bigger names thrown in. Took place in various rooms at Summerhall and a couple of venues around the corner, for a multi-venue fest it was surprisingly easy to bounce between venues. I know the Glasgow equivalent is much more spread out.

Thought it was pretty well organised for a new festival, they had a bunch of last minute drop outs but they managed to find subs for a lot of them, and they did have not only covid but also Storm Arwen to deal with.

Highlights were definitely Anna B Savage, Field Music and Sacred Paws. Anna was playing alone and got a pretty short set, but still managed to command the sizeable room. Field Music’s songs were tight and sound was good, but I couldn’t work out if they actually wanted to be there… Sacred Paws were just an excellent end to the day. Been an age since I’ve seen them and forgot just how much fun they are, an absolute ray of sunshine to end a cold, dark November day. Only photo I took all day was of them:

So yeah, a pretty decent little festival. Hope it runs again next year!

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The Garage is notorious for hot gigs. I think I was at that Thermals gig too (although it might have been more recent). Hottest one I remember was before they did it all up as “The Relentless Garage”, watching The Twilight Singers. The ceiling was wet with sweat.

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Peggy Sue at Dalston Victoria

This band is “my lockdown band” and I mean that in a nice way. The band themselves have some great albums under them and are just a warm and brilliant live act.

Saw them in late February 2020 at Rough Trade East for their excellent album release and thanked them for the gig and said that I’m looking forward to their Tufnell Park Dome gig in a few months. That gig was obviously changed many times over and ended up being a socially distanced gig at Islington Assembly Hall in June this year and my first gig back. That gig kicked arse and the band were just lovely.

Saw them tonight just as things are looking to turn south again unfortunately.

The gig tonight was just great fun and hopefully I get to see them again sooner next time than later.

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We Are Scientists - Limelight, Belfast

Loved With Love & Squalor at the time, enjoyed a couple of singles from the second and third albums but otherwise haven’t kept up with them at all. Every now and then I see they’re playing here and consider going along for nostalgia and then don’t bother. After the lack of gigs in lockdown I decided to head along this time. Was quite fun actually. Enjoyed the funny stage chatter a lot. Quite a good turnout and the crowd were very into them, good to see they’ve still got a decent following, some of whom must have been pretty young when With Love & Squalor came out.

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From that photo, looks like you were standing no more than 6 feet to the right of me!

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Nice! Who were your highlights?


Very very good evening. The vocals were a bit echo-y but that might just be where I was standing. Night sounded HUGE.

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Thanks, I ewasn’t in any way exited to tonight, now I am.

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Dry Cleaning at Moth Club

Earlier this year I had a huge change of opinion on this band. Couldn’t finish a single track when listening at home, but then Scalping dropped out of Wide Awake, and with a gap in the bill I saw these instead just to see what they were like. I was pretty much shocked how much i enjoyed it, and since then they’ve been one of my most listened to artists. There’s probably something melodramatic about “the power of live music” or something daft I can say here, but I’ll just say it’s great to have moments like this once in a while.

Really glad to see them again touring the album, and this was my first time at Moth Club, which is extremely sparkly and nice but the sightlines are a little bit weird. It was also a bit emotional, because the gig was a fundraiser for ovarian cancer, in light of one of one of their mums passing away from it. Sounds like a mood kill but it wasn’t - sad yes, but she sounded like a great person and it was all fairly joyous. And the music! They played pretty much a perfect set of what they’ve got so far. Unsmart Lady was the highlight for me.

And then as if things couldn’t get any better, this was finished by 9:45. Hurrah! KLO tonight which I’m sure won’t finish as early.

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Sounds like a great gig. Nice that early finishes are becoming the norm rather than the exception in my experience of gigs recently. Wonder why things have moved in that direction since things have opened up again (I’m a big fan).

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it’s going the other way for me. Most of the gigs I’ve been to lately are having the main band come on at 9:45 - 10pm. I live an hour away from most of the venues so it really sucks :confused:

I’d had a ticket for Girlschool last night :metal:t4:

Unfortunately they cancelled as one of the band members has covid.

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Kelly Lee Owens @ Electric Brixton…

Have been wanting to see her live for ages, and this didn’t disappoint. Smashed through most of both albums, with a nice build from the slower ones up to a finale of techno bangers. She is such a physical performer, virtually never standing still - at times she was like a high speed lava lamp, and that enthusiasm is damn infectious. Came back at the end to say thanks rather than do an encore which was pretty lovely. Thought that nothing was going to top Self Esteem the other week but this might…have been my favourite gig of the year :thinking:

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I was here too and had an absolute blast!

Conversation sounded SO GOOD live, and yeah, everything just absolutely clicked for me too when seeing them in the flesh.

I got very emotional when they were talking about the bassist’s mum, and how Florence didn’t have any intention of being in the band until she emphasised to her how important she thought that would be.

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this has made me extra keen to see them as someone who was also on the fence about the album, and extra annoyed that their next gig up here has been sold out for ages!

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Saw Self Esteem for a second time on this tour, this time in Oxford Zodiac or whatever it’s branded as these days. Thought it was going to be in the bigger shitter downstairs room, so that was good. Exactly the same set as at Reading, slightly less banter, but still great. Rebecca used one of those electro acoustic Fenders instead of a standard electric, and did the first song in the encore fully acoustic, sat on the front of the stage. The crowd was once again silent throughout the song. Great stuff as ever.

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Sleaford Mods @ Printworks…

Only my second time at this venue - it is an absolute barn. That said, the sound is perfect from all spots which is pleasing. They played pretty much all of the new album, which is fine by me as I think it’s their best in awhile. The addition of live signing was brilliant - I now think that every act should have it. Third time I’ve seen The Mods this year, and this was comfortably their most polished show even if their cover of Yazoo’s Don’t Go was completely (purposefully?) shambolic.

Crowd was very heavy on middle aged men - always nice to feel like one of the youngsters at a gig these days (which I say as a middle aged man). Highest amount of mask wearing I’ve seen at a gig since the pandemic kicked off too. Pic of the action - or is it the Zion rave scene from Matrix III :thinking:

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Kelly Lee Owens / Some Dickhead

I was not in a good mood yesterday, I was full of red wine and bad pizza and had to drag myself from West to East London to get to the venue.

I get in and this lad starts.

I haven’t hated a support like that in a long time. Mumble rapping, white noise drone, ear splitting blasts of drums that never even tried for a beat and then! To top it off some other dickhead came on and started to play free jazz sax over this audio hellscape.
Get fucked, whoever you are.

So Kelly was up against it. I wasn’t even that excited for the gig, I nearly didn’t bother going.
Well that would have been stupid.

The first 30 minutes were pretty chilled, very nice but needed a bit more, and then she delivered a face melting techno set. It absolutely blew me away. I was not ready for it but it was exactly what I needed. About 20 minutes into the techno I realised that she was reminding me of Underworld at their peak and that’s about the highest compliment I can give a dance act.
And after decades of seeing people just standing behind desks twiddling their knobs I really enjoyed her set up and watching her throw shapes she played.

I really need to catch her again.

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Oh no was it Lewis’ mum? They mentioned her in an interview about how much she would feed them when rehearsing at his house. How sad.

Really wanted to go to this gig, got a last minute offer from Dice but couldn’t go as I was feeling so rubbish. Seeing them in Bristol next year though, can’t wait

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