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REVIEW INDIE
PEARL AND THE PUPPETS
King Tut’s, Glasgow, Fri 18 Jul 0..
With a voice that‘s as elegantly fiery as the red dress she wears to take to the stage. Katie Sutherland — aka Pearl — puts on a feistin charming and totally beguiling show for what she tells the crowd is her first-ever gig at Tut's with the band.
With favourite 'Mango Tree‘ played early on, her smooth. velvety vocals provide light foil to her accompanying Puppets' intensely pounding rhythm section that make the floor and walls shake with virtually every beat. increasing in momentum throughout the set.
Chattily telling the crowd that “it's so good to be back in Glasgow doing a show‘. she takes a solo turn at one point which puts her distinctive voice — part Regina Spektor. part Dolores O‘Riordan, and at its best soaring
through the high notes — centre stage.
The band admirably manage to keep things the right side of twee on a particularly Belle and Sebastian- esque number. a glockenspiel even joins in the fun and they even bow to pressure to play an extra song to keep the punters happy. And you can't say fairer than that.
(Emma Newlands)
68 THE LIST 4—18 Sep 2008
REVIEW ROCK THE WAVE PICTURES
Barfly, Glasgow, Fri 15 Aug 0...
This trio may be from London, but the fine city of Glasgow is evidently a Spiritual home for singer David Tattersall, who excitedly announces ‘I used to live here. I wrote this here!‘ before one of the band's raw but epic numbers. one of which includes the line ‘I like the view out of my Glasgow window'.
Not that his wistfully, warbling, Scott Walker-esque croon takes centre stage for the whole time: even the drummer gets a shot on lead vocals — just like Phil Collins rising from the Genesis drum kit to become lead singer, Tattersall explains.
But there's something else coming in the air tonight, a definite trace of Jonathan Richman and the kind of energetically elegant ‘60s film score sounds pedalled so effectively by The Last Shadow Puppets.
Throw in a few extremely pleasing harmonies. the shrewdly-observed kitchen-sink drama of the lyrics and Tattersall finishing the set in style by stepping away from the mic as he carries on singing the last few bars. and ten years chipping away at the rock‘n‘roll coalface should hopefully pay off this time round.
(Emma Newlands)
Tomorrows music today This issue: Punch and the Apostles.
Claire Sawers meets Glasgow’s own gypsy folk punk mash-up septet ‘We're not exactly palatable. but not immediately repulsive.‘ suggests lead singer Paul Napier, to sum up the sound of Punch and the Apostles. the Glasgow seven-
piece who've been bringing chaos to traditional folk music fOr almost a year now. Mashing up gypsy violins. flamenco guitars and frantic klezmer trumpets, PATA's fashion-dodging approach to the music industry means they can blast out noises from a circus freak-show or bull-fight one minute. then whisk their crowd to a drunken bar mitzvah in bohemian Montmartre the next.
‘There's a definite anti-commercial approach to what we do.’ says Napier, who plays guitar and keyboards while the others juggle diving bells. accordions and
something called a “spinning jenny‘ to create their old-fashioned, upbeat and riotous noise. ‘We're sneaking old musical styles back in like a Trojan horse.‘ he adds. explaining their weird hybrid of Tom Waits' theatricality with tango, polka, Eastern European or blues styles. ‘We want to revive old music forms that people
might have wrongly dismissed as boring.‘
“We're not into slickness.‘ points out his sister Juliana. PATA‘s only female. and a
fan of bands like Gogol Bordello and A Hawk and a Hacksaw. ‘So we wouldn't want Timbaland producing our stuff. It's very important for us to stay in control.‘
Franz Ferdinand's management are rumoured to have approached them. but they
are still unsigned. giving them free reign to mess around with their fast-paced cacophony of styles. ‘There's a lot of tripping over instruments when we perform
live.‘ says Juliana. “but that doesn‘t stop us from dancing.‘
I Punch and the Apostles play Oran Mor, Glasgow, Wed 77 Sep and The Caves, l Edinburgh, Thu 78 Sep. as part of The Mill. www. them/ll-live. com. Their second sing/e, ‘/ am a Hobo' will be launched at Stereo, Glasgow, Mon 20 Oct.
REVIEW POST-PUNK EegL VICKERS AND THE
lngleby Gallery, Edinburgh, Thu 28 Sep. 0000 “You‘ve all soaked up the reverb a bit.‘ noted Paul Vickers a couple of songs in. ‘which is good‘. He seemed a bit dazed by this whole experience. although that might just be down to the ex-Dawn of the Replicants singer's Henry Rollins meets Daniel Johnson brand of stage presence.
Still, it was a strange kind of a show. and not just because we were all crowded in the corner of the first floor gallery watching Vickers howl and growl at eye level. The gorgeous new lngleby is also the site of Edinburgh's famous old Venue. and nostalgia surged through the air just standing on the pavement.
This gig was both a finale to the Edinburgh Art Festival and a handy by-product of the fact the gallery and the band share personnel. Disguised in animal masks which are part Dr Seuss, part IRA. the eternally brilliant The Leg ploughed through a short set which included a quite sublimely incorrect cover of Cher's ‘lf l Could Turn Back Time‘. ‘You're not meant to play gigs in galleries.‘ said Vickers warily. but — as one attendee noted — it's not art if it's not offending someone. (David Pollock)
REVIEW EXPERl-MENTAL MISSING TWIN PRESENTS Cameo Cinema, Edinburgh, Sat 23 Aug one Missing Twin is the publishing empire of cartoon genius Malcy Duff. Alongside geek-soul brother and Giant Tanker Ali Robertson. Duff makes up half of premier lo-fi fidgets. Usurper. This popcorn-friendly triple feature of late- night wow-and-splutter sees the lip of the Cameo stage show-casing an Eisensteinian cut-up of sound and vision.
Usurper themselves provide the opening funnies. as their increasingly artful exercises in toy-box scritch-n- scratch, here set to projections of Duff‘s equally oddball art-works. are the next stage on from sound poet Bob Cobbing and post-Python pranksters The Bohman Brothers. Open Eye Duo who follow are a strictly B—movie i deconstruction of floor-Tom and guitar via gaffa tape interventions.
Tonight's main feature even has a disaster movie name. Towering Breaker work up a duet of pounding vibraphone minimalism to sensurround proportions. What‘s fascinating is how the sound translates in a dead acoustic designed for film rather than assaulted by black box echo. Like glorified Foley artists providing Dolby-scale sound effects for slapstick Snuff, this particular brat pack are the real deal. (Neil Cooper)