Gig review - HMV Next Big Thing: Band of Skulls, General Fiasco, Birds of Tokyo

The second of my HMV gigs took me up to the Relentless Garage in Islington for a rather edgier affair than the jovial pop extravaganza I had been treated to at the Borderline a couple of days earlier.

To start the review off in true unprofessional style, I am unable to comment on the first band of the evening Birds of Tokyo, purely because I got too sidetracked by food and the pub prior to the gig starting. However, I will say that there were several people in the venue wearing the band's T-shirts and everyone looked pretty happy when I rocked up after their set had finished, so make of that what you will.

General Fiasco were up next and despite some promising pre-gig listens to their music, their live performance was not quite up to the same level. Kudos to lead singer Owen though, his voice is strong which carries the songs well and this makes the overall sound they produce hard to ignore. The main problem that this eager trio face is the fact that there are currently so many new bands emerging from the woodwork that it's hard for them to distinguish themselves from their woodworm neighbours. General Fiasco's music is appealing and listener friendly, and it certainly doesn't make me want to switch it straight back off, which is always a start. Unfortunately it's also the kind of music I would listen to once and probably discard again until a very rainy day.

Ultimately the evening was completely stolen by headliners Band of Skulls, who were more than worth the ticket fee by themselves. Dominating the crowd with their blues-y rock from the beginning of their opening guitar-led stormer of a track, 'Death By Diamonds', it was blindingly obvious that the trio on stage were there to make one hell of an impression. To say that they succeeded would be somewhat of an understatement; I have not been so impacted by a live performance of a band in a while. Quite reasonably, the band are drawing comparisons to the White Stripes, what with their startlingly similar gritty yet fluctuating guitar riffs, and the lead singer's twangy vocals in particular. Add in to the mix the fact that lead vocal duties are split with a female and some might say the group are London's equivalent of Michigan's finest. Their lyrics are meaningful without being cliched, and the melodies catchy without being annoying. Powering through their set with a raucous intensity, they impressively managed to sustain the watching masses' attentions during songs that clocked in at over five minutes in length. After an hour long set the band departed before returning for a disappointingly modest one song encore, with the enthusiastic crowd reaction demonstrating the fact that they could have easily carried on playing for yet another hour still. If you haven't heard of Band of Skulls yet, I can promise it won't be long before you find yourself basking in their progressive glory and doing yourself a favour by going to see them play live.



www.myspace.com/bandofskulls
www.myspace.com/generalfiasco
www.myspace.com/birdsoftokyo