Went along last night to see Wire at the wonderful Brudenell Social Club. Magic Rock’s “Rapture” ale adding a nice accompaniment to the evenings proceedings.
Support band Xavier appear – Tad mental. 3 blokes, 1 on Roland Sequencer, 1 on Drums and 1 on guitar (no vocals) – They jam for around 40 mins – 2 songs. Dunno how they keep it going for so long, particularly the drummer. First 10 mins prove interesting but I’m kinda bored after that. Some of the crowd seem to really dig it.
Wire appear around 9.30 – We’d already seen them as they did their own onstage final testing 10 mins earlier. They have a new addition to the band – A keyboardist who’s served time in Julian Cope’s band – He adds a much needed melodic layer IMO although at times his glances across the stage remind me of Les from Vic and Bob’s “Big Night Out” – Maybe he’s scared of chives. I’m being too harsh on the chap as he’s certainly adding to proceedings. Colin and co looking quite youthful tonight – Colin has an iPad on a stand in front of him which I think has the setlist on it – There’s a couple of unintended comedy moments this evening. Colin swipes his iPad at the end of every song to see the next track – At one stage he’s playing the ending to one song and rocking out on his guitar – mid strum he swipes the iPad which kinda kills the ending – a bit like shouting “Next!!” at some talent show hopeful. The venue becomes quite warm now. Colin removes his black sweatshirt to reveal another identical black sweatshirt underneath. Maybe it’s the “Rapture” ale but it was pretty comical.
Not bad setlist – Some old classics “Another the Letter”, “Map Ref” and there’s plenty off the new album which sounds much better live. That said the venue’s PA sounds chronic, one of the speakers crackled throughout and the vocals were pretty inaudible. A few interesting encores – One of my fave modern day Wire tracks “23 Years Too Late” doesn’t really work live. Graham’s plum English delivery isn’t really feeling it in this live arena – although Colin’s punk rant chorus is rather splendid.
Filed under Music
Tagged as Brudenell, Leeds, Wire
