crazybobbles

I was initially happy to see that Howling Bells were touring again, but to discover that Asobi Seksu were supporting added the extra awesomeness to the gig. At the end of the gig I was left humming along to both bands as I danced my way back home.

It was quite a cosy evening with loads of friends from different circles coming to see this gig, Howling Bells definitely have a loyal fan base who are dying to hear their new album Radio Wars. Upon arriving at the venue (which has always proved hard for first timers) I was stuck in a waiting game for folks to turn up before we could actually go in, during that time I saw a ticket tout I keep seeing all the time before gigs (I thought he only hung around at the ULU but turns out he does Camden and Angel too). Anyway the only reason why I mentioned him was because whilst waiting for people to turn up they kept advertising it as “tickets to see the Bells”. Either they’re like, brothers with the band, or they really need to do some research on what band they are buying/selling tickets for (refer to my banter on ticket touts), needless to say it was quite annoying hearing touters say the wrong band name in their horrible grim voice.

After meeting up with Max, Anika, Sophie, Aino (and even John and Preamble), it was time to actually head to the venue and get this party started. Once in the venue we headed right to the stage to enjoy (hmm stretching it?) the red light company. Sadly not my cup of tea and probably got demotived from them by Max’s rather critical review of them when he saw them at the Boilerroom. Kinda wished Asobi Seksu was the only support so we got more songs from them.

After having a few listens on their latest upcoming album Hush, I was quite pumped to see Asobi Seksu play tonight. The band came on to set up their own gear and immediately I had an urge to comment at how cute the singer, Yuki, is. The stage was decorated with fairy lights which definitely aided the dreamy shoegazing set that is Asobi Seksu. They started with Sing Tomorrow’s Praise and played quite a few tracks from their new album. I was glad they played Strawberries and end with Red Sea from their second album Citrus (Strawberries being my highlight). Below was the setlist:

• Sing Tomorrow’s Praise
• Strawberries
• Me & Mary
• In the Sky
• Thursday
• Pink Cloud Tracing Paper
• Transparence
• Red Sea

Their soothing yet heavy My Bloody Valentine esque sound was relaxing to the ear and makes me want to use my phaser pedal more when jamming. Thoroughly enjoyed it and will be catching her playing again at the ICA (but this time they’ll be headlining. The gig is sold out but if you live outside London you can catch them at other shows).

Next up, Howling Bells. I’m a big fan of them and have seen them live enough times to know that they put on a good show, from the sexy hypnotic swaying of Juanita Stein, to the catchy riffs from Joel Stein. Tonight Juanita was sporting a sexy blue sequin top with some tight shiny leggings/trousers (I was informed by a frind of the lady variety that they were leggings). They start off with an oldie, Blessed Night and afterwards play quite a lot of new tracks from their upcoming album Radio Wars (in fact, I think they actually played all the tracks from their album). A couple of oldies were played too including Wishing Stone, Setting Sun and the jumpy Low (low low low) Happening.

When seeing them support Mercury Rev at Shepherds Bush Empire, they were only able to play a few songs from their new album, this time I was able to hear new tracks including Digital Hearts and Golden Web.

Here’s Golden Web in action, note, I do not apologise for the swaying, I was pretty much hypnotised.

Quite a few new songs are quite synthy based and had Juanita singing without a guitar but she’s obviously got the charisma and charms to sway left and right of the stage (not that her sway to bassist Brendon isn’t and Joel aren’t cool).

The highlight of the show was most likely when she screwed up her guitar during Setting Sun. Noticing that she needed to retune her guitar as well as sort the feedback coming from the mic she quickly stopped the song to address the problem, the audience cheered at the abrupt halt as Juanita explains that she feels close enough to the audience to do stuff like this. Personally I love it when things like that happen, it really breaks the 4th wall down and brings us closer to the band as humans and not all singing all dancing robots (I’d like to see a robot dance like Juanita mind). After a second or third attempt at tuning the guitar Juanita eventually hands the guitar over to the roadies and gets a replacement one midway through the song (cue another cheer from the audience). She noticed that we cheered even more when she messed her guitar up than the times she doesn’t.

The band finishied with Into the Chaos, their first single for their latest album. They came back for an encore and spoke of a song from an artist that’s truely inspired us to shave our heads. So here’s to the epic end that is Howling Bells covering Toxic by the late great Britney Spears (i know she’s not dead, but i love using that phrase).

and that was about it! I’m ever so tempted to catch them again at Brighton, they are also doing an instore show at Fopp on 2nd March so mark that on your calenders folk! Hope you enjoy the photos and whatnot, man I miss long waffly reviews :p If you want a more studio sounding cover of Toxic, do check her out on the Radio 2 Dermot o’Leary show with Zoe Ball covering, it’s around 42 minutes ;).