Review: Embrace – O2 Academy, Glasgow 28/03/2018

About a month ago Embrace released their seventh album ‘Love Is A Basic Need’. To this point of 2018 I would say it is the best album released so far this year. As a result, I was rather looking forward to seeing the band take the album on the road. I went to check them out on the opening night of the tour at Glasgow’s O2 Academy a few weeks after the album’s release.

They opened with a new track, ‘Wake Up Call’, which felt like the perfect opening and was actually the track I was hoping they would open with. The performance sounded huge and right away I was struck by how good frontman Danny McNamara’s voice sounded. As the opening song, this was received by the crowd as if it was an old classic. It was then followed by a run of actual old classics, ‘All You Good Good People’, ‘Nature’s Law’, ‘Follow You Home’ and my favourite Embrace song ‘Come Back To What You Know’. These all brought massive singalongs from a jubilant crowd. The band were on top form and the Glasgow audience lapped it up.

‘Rabbit Hole’ from the new record was up next with a stirring performance before guitarist Richard McNamara stepped up to take over lead vocals on another new song, ‘Where You Sleeping’. I think this might be my favourite ever Richard-sung Embrace track, it builds brilliantly from a soft ballad to pounding bass and drums reminiscent of the backing sound used on the band’s previous self-titled record. Not content with blowing us away with this though Richard went on to roll out an epic rendition of ‘Refugees’ from the aforementioned album.

Danny triumphantly strode back onstage after this, the sign of a man who knows he’s having a good night. Old hits ‘Someday’ and ‘One Big Family’ were rolled out before the title track of the new album, ‘Love Is A Basic Need’. I had previously seen Embrace perform this song live in Edinburgh in late 2016 but it felt different this time around. At that point it had been a relatively low key stand alone single that not everyone seemed to know, but that has all changed. Everyone knew it and it sounded massive. Danny teased the crowd during the introduction to ‘Save Me’ next, hinting that they were all too old to jump during the song, luckily they weren’t, even if they took some coaxing! As one of the younger members of the crowd I was glad to see everyone still getting into the spirit of it.

The beautiful ‘Gravity’ drifted along next before ‘Ashes’ brought the set to a grandstanding close. For years now I have thought this was one of Embrace’s best live songs, and this show was no different. An absolutely outstanding version of the song, with the whole band in perfect sync.

At the beginning of their encore the band debuted a new song live, ‘All That Remains’. You would never have guessed it was their first live performance of it though as it was truly phenomenal, arguably the best song of the night. I was quite astonished by how good this track was. I had previously thought it was one of my favourite songs on the album but now think it’s one of the best things I’ve heard all year. The exciting ‘Protection’ bounced along to add a bit of pace and jumping to the encore. An interesting selection to play in amongst the slow songs but it worked a treat.

Scottish singer Kerri Watt joined the band to sing on the new song ‘Never’ for what was a rather beautiful rendition. With Kerri’s vocals matching perfectly with Danny’s it made for a great duet. Both Danny and Richard were on great form all night, prompting many fans and Danny himself to say it was the best he’d sung in over ten years!

As ever, the title track from the band’s debut album ‘The Good Will Out’ brought the show to a close with a chorus of ‘la la la’s’ from the crowd. A top class gig to match a top class album. Embrace are back and they’re the best band in Britain right now. Danny promised they will be back next year to tour ‘The Good Will Out’, potentially at Barrowland. I will definitely be there.

Setlist:

Wake Up Call
All You Good Good People
Nature’s Law
Follow You Home
Come Back to What You Know
Rabbit Hole
Where You Sleeping
Refugees
Someday
One Big Family
Love Is a Basic Need
Save Me
Gravity
Ashes
———————————-
All That Remains
Protection
Never
The Good Will Out

Resonate 2017 – A Volunteer’s Perspective

Last week on Thursday 16th November I gained a rare opportunity, to take volunteer at the inaugural Resonate conference in Glasgow. For those of you who don’t know about Resonate, it is a new musical conference and event taking place in the Barras Art and Design Centre (BAaD). The conference itself ran from 9am to 6:30pm with a variety of panels, workshops and drop ins. I was stationed in the pizza watching over two events: Meet the Funders and Meet the Rights Organisations. But more on that later.

We arrived at BAad at 8am and gathered in the attractive main hall where the body of the conference took part. Before registration of delegates began at 9am we set up the drop in halls and stalls along with the registration area itself. Staff from the brilliant 23rd Precinct along with the volunteers set all of these up, with a good team spirit being established immediately. This was a theme which would continue all day, I’m pleased to say.

With everything set up and looking good, the delegates began to arrive and look around the venue. They were then treated to the Opening Keynote at 10am, ‘In Conversation with Ged Doherty’, a fascinating insight into the music industry from the chairman of the BPI (British Phonographic Industry) and Brit Awards. He also spoke about his more recent ventures into the film industry. SMIA (Scottish Music Industry Association)’s Tam Coyle conducted the event and was entertaining, setting a pleasant tone for the day ahead. While preparing my drop in centre for the first session at 11am I was lucky enough to get the chance to listen to Ged Doherty and was thoroughly impressed that Resonate had got such a figure to open their first ever event.

At 11am the first panel of the day started, ‘Celebrate Women in Music’, followed by ‘Joining the Dots’ at 12pm. However, by this point Meet the Funders was well underway and I was watching over the thriving event. As soon as  the Opening Keynote had ended there was a flurry of movement towards the pizzeria, with all of the funders being kept busy with delegates and a small queue building, talking about how much they liked the look of BAaD and how they had enjoyed Ged Doherty. In this drop in we had Chris Tams (BPI), Jamie Houston (Creative Scotland), Ian Smith (Last Night From Glasgow), David Culbert & Liam Hennessy (Help Musicians UK) and Jen McGlone (Glow Art).

Interesting, Meet The Rights Organisation brought a slightly different vibe to the Pizzeria as we were joined by Kevin Benz (Broadcast Music Inc), Stuart Fleming (Performing Rights Society), Richie Malone (Performing Rights Limited), Duncan McCrone (Mehnical Copyright Protection Society) and Marco Giulinai (PPL). They informed and chatted with a crowd with quite a relaxed atmosphere. I had the chance to have a chat with Stuart  and Kevin , both of whom were full of interesting and useful information and enjoyable to speak to. I also had the pleasure of chatting of chatting with Andrew from Chemikal Underground, who whilst not part of the panel also gave me some great insights and entertaining anecdotes.

There was then a break for lunch, provided by A’Challtain restuarant – a tasty curry with rice, chips and naan bread. I dutifully provided the sound guys with their lunch before grabbing my own and very much enjoyed it. There was some live acoustic performances during this  break, as people casually strolled round the stalls in the main hall, such as the Electric Honey stall which was full of great, unique Electric Honey products related to both Glasgow Kelvin College and bands on the label such as Pronto Mama.

After lunch, Meet the Funders and Meet the Rights Organisations reconvened with a new set of interested attendees, whilst on the main stage there were panels of ‘What You Syncing?’ and ‘Are You Even Listening?’. When half past 4 rolled around I was pleased to get the chance to watch the panel, ‘Developing the Infrastructure of Scotland’s Music Industry’ featuring head of DF Concerts, Geoff Ellis. Whilst this panel was taking place news filtered through that DF had extended the 2018 TRSNMT Festival to 5 days.

After a brief announcement from Help Musicians UK there was the final event of the conference, ‘The Man, The Myth, ‘The Legendary A&R Man, Dave Ambrose’. This was genuinely brilliant, with some fantastic stories. Dave Ambrose has worked with an unbelievable amount of huge and historic bands including The Sex Pistols, Radiohead, Duran Duran (who he spoke very highly of), Queen and AC/DC. Again, Tam Coyle conducted proceeding and the audience clearly loved this talk. This was another feature of the day, anyone I spoke to enthused about how much they’d enjoyed and been impressed by the conference. Credit here again goes to 23rd Precinct for putting together such a great event.

The evening brought Resonate Live, and with it performances from Flew The Arrow, Ant Thomaz, The Nickajack Men and Declan Welsh and the Decadent West. There were some very enjoyable performances and I’ll definitely be checking out some of these acts again, particularly The Nickajack Men who I had never heard of before but was really impressed by. I had heard of Declan Welsh and the Decadent Welsh before but never seen them. They put on a strong closing set to finally bring to the day to an enjoyable end.

After such a successful first year, hopefully Resonate will be back in 2018 and will be even bigger and better!

 

 

Review: The Killers and Juanita Stein Live at SSE Hydro

Last night one of the biggest bands in the world took to the stage as the SSE Hydro in Glasgow. I of course refer to The Killers from fabulous Las Vegas.

Before the main act took the stage though, we watched Juanita Stein of Howling Bells, who played a pleasant set that would have perhaps been better fitted to opening for Jason Isbell than The Killers. Unfortunately the sound seemed rather muffled during the early part of her set, thankfully improving as she continued. The audience were attentive and seemed to appreciate her performance as they played songs from her solo album ‘America’.

Half an hour later, a feeling of anticipation was sweeping through the cavernous room, waiting for The Killers come on stage. Their stage set up was rather spectacular as the band took to the stage one by one to begin the show. There are only two original Killers in the current live line up, frontman Brandon Flowers and the mighty Ronnie Vannucci Jr. on drums but overall there were no fewer than nine people on stage! Ted Sablay and Jake Blanton are filling in for Dave Keuning and Mark Stoermer on lead guitar and bass respectively.  Taylor Milne and Robbie Connolly also joined the touring band this year while Erica Canales, Danielle Withers and Amanda Brown sang backing vocals. With two guitarists, a bassist, a keyboardist, three backing vocals added to Brandon and Ronnie, the band have a pretty huge sound.

The band opened with new album opener and title track ‘Wonderful Wonderful’ the band started in fine fettle with an enticing stage display including some amazing visuals such as thunder crashes to accompany the crashing of the drums. The three ladies singing backing vocals really added to the strength of the vocal for the chanting in the song.

Early in the set the band threw in big hits such as ‘Somebody Told Me’ and one of my personal highlights, ‘Spaceman’. ‘Run For Cover’ was possibly the best of the new material aired from ‘Wonderful Wonderful’ with even ‘The Man’, my least favourite Killers song sounding better live than on record.

The tail end on the song brought a fantastic run of hits with my other highlight ‘A Dustland Fairytale’ followed by a snippet of Dire Straits’ ‘Romeo and Juliet’, a song which the band had previously covered on their rarities collection Sawdust. After this came a triple header of ‘Runaways’, ‘Read My Mind’ and ‘All These Things I’ve Done’ which raised a massive singalong from the 13,000 strong Hydro crowd.

The most surprising song of the show was probably ‘I Can’t Stay’ from third album ‘Day & Age’, a song which I wouldn’t have expected particularly much from or rated too highly. But in fact it was one of the most enjoyable songs of the show, a great performance of a laid back track to contrast some of the more bombastic songs. Overall, the band played a strong 22-song set with a good mix of songs from each of their five albums and ‘Sawdust’. My only qualm would be that I would have liked to hear more song from ‘Sam’s Town’.

After a five minute encore break, the band strutted back on with Brandon now sporting a full gold, glitter-coated suit and sunglasses, looking every bit the part of Mr. Las Vegas. They launched into uber-religious number ‘The Calling’ from the new album with its sharp guitar lines reminiscent of 2006’s ‘Uncle Johnny’. This was followed by three of the band’s biggest hits – ‘Jenny Was A Friend of Mine’, ‘When You Were Young’ and finally ‘Mr. Brightside’. There was no surprise and no doubt that this was the crowd’s favourite song with the venue positively erupting as the track began.

Brandon promised that The Killers would try to be back very soon, prompting us to think that they will be headlining next year’s expanded TRNSMT Festival, which you can here more about here. If they do, they will yet again be very worthy headliners.

The Killers Setlist:

Wonderful Wonderful
The Man
Somebody Told Me
Spaceman
The Way It Was
Run For Cover
I Can’t Stay
Smile Like You Mean It
For Reasons Unknown
Shadowplay (Joy Division cover)
Rut
Life to Come
Human
A Dustland Fairytale
Romeo and Juliet (Dire Straits cover)
Runaways
Read My Mind
All These Things That I’ve Done
————————————————————
The Calling
Jenny Was A Friend of Mine
When You Were Young
Mr. Brightside

Ten Smaller Bands to see at TRNSMT 2017

This summer’s TRNSMT Festival has some massive headliners in Radiohead, Kasabian and Biffy Clyro but as with any festival it’s not all about the big bands. Mumblings and Ramblings has helpfully picked out a few of the best acts from the smaller stages for you to see, clash dependent of course.

Check out what day and stage these bands are on and watch a video from each of them, then if you like them why not and go and look them up and see them at the festival! All of the band names in the article are links to their Facebook pages.

Sundara Karma (Saturday – King Tut’s Stage)

BlackWaters (Sunday – JackRocks Stage)

JR Green (Sunday – King Tut’s Stage)

Superfood (Sunday – JackRocks Stage)

Tijuana Bibles (Sunday – JackRocks Stage)

The Amazons (Sunday – King Tut’s Stage)

Neon Waltz (Friday – JackRocks Stage)

Medicine Men (Saturday – JackRocks Stage)

Louis Berry (Friday – King Tut’s Stage)

Vida (Saturday – JackRocks Stage)

Inspiral Carpets @ O2 Academy Glasgow 04/12/2015

Normally Mumblings and Ramblings would include a review of a support act within the review of the main band at a show, but a legendary band like Inspiral Carpets are different and so it only seemed right to give them their own review.

Opening for Shed Seven at Glasgow’s O2 Academy, Inspiral Carpets took to the stage in a packed hall with a crowd who were clearly there to see them as well as the headliners. This felt more like a headline set than a support set in any ways. The band were greeted by shouts of ‘Mooo’ in reference to their logo and chants of ‘Boon Army’ for keyboardist Clint Boon.

Unlike many support bands who hold back their hits until later in the set Inspiral Carpets hit the ground running. ‘Joe’ and ‘You’re So Good For Me’ made for a high tempo start before two major hits are presented in the form of ‘This Is How It Feels’ and ‘She Comes In The Fall’. Rarely in any gig will you find yourself wondering if the night can get any better after only the fourth song of a support set.

The rest of the set is packed with hits with the other modern song being the brilliant ‘Let You Down’ from the band’s self-titled 2014 album. The song features a spoken word section by punk poet John Cooper Clark. JCC’s piece was played over the sound system while the band played the backing instrumental, a welcome surprise in the set.

The band concluded their set with ‘Saturn 5’, receiving a great reception from the crowd whose passion was matched by the band, particularly bassist Martyn Walsh. This was my first time seeing Inspiral Carpets indoors having seen them twice previously at festivals. This was by far the best of those performances given their own crowd and with frontman Stephen Holt in strong voice. They impressed so much as a support that I would recommend seeing them as a headliner.

Setlist:

Joe
You’re So Good For Me
This Is How It Feels
She Comes In The Fall
Two World Collide
I Want You
Find Out Why
Dragging Me Down
Directing Traffik
Let You Down
Saturn 5

Billy Bragg @ O2 ABC 03/12/2015

Last week one of Britain’s most outspoken singer songwriters took to the stage in Glasgow’s O2 ABC, the venue where I first saw Billy Bragg live in 2008. Unlike his last visit to Scotland two years ago, Bragg played solo tonight – joined only sporadically by pedal steed and guitar player CJ Hillman.

It doesn’t take long for him to take aim at his first target of the night, hipster beards, which Bragg classes as any beard without at least a tinge of grey. Whilst in the media he generally hits out at serious issues such as racism, fascism, the right wing and cynicism in his own shows he mixes these with some lighter topics like men never being as good at D.I.Y. as their fathers.

With no album to promote on this tour the crowd were treated to a greatest hits set starting with ‘A Lover Sings’ and delving back to Bragg’s earliest material with ‘To Have And To Have Not’. This all came after one of the most subdued, understated stage entrances you could picture. Lights dimmed slightly, no intro music, no announcement, just walking on with a mug of what one would assume was herbal tea. However, we are told that for this mini Scottish tour, Billy is in fact drinking Bovril for the first time on tour.

Only a few modern songs are included in the set with ‘Never Buy The Sun’, ‘Nobody Knows Nothing Anymore’ and ‘Handyman Blues’ all sounding every bit as good as the old classics. The highlight of the set was me was a fantastic version of ‘Sexuality’ performed with CJ Hillman. For the live version of this song the lyrics are changed to include probably the funniest line Billy Bragg has ever written:

“I had an uncle who once played for Red Star Belgrade,
He said some things are really best left unspoken,
I’ve left your auntie and I’ve run off with the postman”

The four song encore that follows the set is a treat with performer and audience really connecting during a powerful performance of ‘Between The Wars’ before the show came to its conclusion with the masterpiece ‘Waiting For The Great Leap Forward’ and the anthem ‘A New England’.

Whilst Billy Bragg may be known to some people now as being more involved in politics than in music, there’s no doubt his music continues to stand strong and he is one of the country’s finest showmen.

Various Cruelties Live @ King Tuts Review

I wrote a review of this gig for Its All Indie, you should check out that site – I’d recommend it! I was a fan well before I thought of writing for it. You can find my article here:

http://www.itsallindie.com/2012/01/gig-review-various-cruelties-king-tuts.html

Meanwhile, I thought I’d post the review here too because a couple of people have asked me to. But if you do read it here at least give Its All Indie a look too.

Here it is:

You can often feel a real of anticipation amongst a crowd at the gig of a rising band like Various Cruelties but it’s clear to see the bands themselves are excited to be back in Glasgow playing the legendary King Tuts Wah Wah Hut with singer Liam O’Donnell telling the crowd how much they’ve been looking forward to this particular show.

But before they take to the stage local indie band Huevo And The Giant play a chirpy half hour set. It’s clear they’ve roped in a lot of their friends to watch but the neutrals among the crowd are soon won over by their blend of cheery tunes with ‘Wings (We Are The Kids)’ being a particular highlight. I’ll be sure to check them out again.

But as enjoyable as they were, Various Cruelties are a level up. They don’t waste any time getting started, kicking off with the up-tempo ‘Neon Truth’ getting the crowd moving right away. If this wasn’t enough new single ‘Great Unknown’ is up next as the band get into their stride. Across their forty five minute set they entice us in with their soul-tinted indie. With Etta James having passed away yesterday, the band dedicate ‘She Is The One’ to the former soul legend. They seem to have upped their game musically from their earlier releases with tracks such as ‘Don’t Want To Waste Your Time’ sounding bigger than its ever sounded before with a beefed up beat behind it. Playing twelve songs, it would appear they may have premièred their whole album, and if so it looks like it’s going to be a great début album!

With chanting for bassist Beanie throughout the show, the band take their leave after new song ‘Beautiful Delirium’ winds its way into their fans’ ears. They’re only off of the stage for a matter of seconds though before storming back on to finish with their biggest hit ‘Chemicals’, drawing a huge sing-along and sending fans and band alike home happy.

Setlist: