LIVE REVIEW: Release The Bats - ATP/Capsule Halloween Party - 1st November @ Custard Factory, Birmingham
Categories: Audio, Reviews
Written By: admin
Release The Bats - ATP/Capsule Halloween Party
Lightning Bolt
When someone told me that Lightning Bolt were playing here in Birmingham, I started to run around making a high pitched sort of girlie noise. I love Lightning Bolt and I firmly believe that they are the best band in the world. If you don’t agree then take it outside. So imagine my surprise and horror when I turned up at quarter past seven (have you ever got to a gig that early?) and while walking in I thought “…that sounds like Lightning Bolt.”
It was Lightning Bolt. Finishing. I am not having a good year for gigs, having missed Secret Chiefs 3, Dillinger Escape Plan and Nine Inch Nails in the last year. Anyway, it sounded like a new tune so hopefully they have an album coming out soon.
Pissed Jeans
I had never heard of three of the bands in the line up and this was one of the surprises. The vocalist came out and stripped to the waist before he’d even started, but he had reason to because when they began their Neurosis / Isis style assault, he expended a lot of energy. I mean a lot. A disturbed hybrid of Mick Jagger and Ian Curtis, I can’t make up my mind whether or not he was a genius. Lyrics that were the very model of banality (”I’ve got a headache….And this rash on my back”) teamed with a diaphragm of steel, he veered between Henry Rollins and a sort of doom metal Bez. I will investigate further.
Wooden Shjips
Another band I had never heard of, they came on and asked for the lights to be dimmed to a civilised level, so I warmed to them straight away. They looked like they’d escaped from the seventies so I wasn’t surprised when they started playing a feedback infused psychedelic rock that I eventually decided sounds like a Butthole Surfers record at half speed. I also couldn’t make out a single word he sang but I did like their expansive solos. In all honesty though, I felt compelled to wander off half way through their set pulled by the long, long queue at the bar rather than pushed away by the music. Honestlywhen we walked in we went straight to the bar and it took half an hour to get served. And it being a fancy dress night, we had the very galling experience of someone in a sailor outfit turning up after us in the queue and managing to get served before us. That pissed me off but not as much as discovering the second “bar” was actually outside under the railway arch through which wind and rain were literally howling.
OM
Capsule and ATP, I have a question. Why, oh why, did you put this terrible, terrible band on at this time and Lightning Bolt on first? If you’d swapped them on the bill the place would have gone mental, as it was this Spinal Tap-esque bore fest took the wind out of sails of the whole event. They played two very dull songs in 45 minutes and by the end of their set, the place was awash with chatter. The only people who seemed to enjoy it, were people who would have enjoyed the sound of rubber bands and arse clapping, such was the quality of the drugs they had managed to snare. Total shit.
Shellac
The only other band I had heard of out of the lot, and I was quite excited, even if (to my enormous shame) I have never heard any and don’t own an album. This situation will not last long now I have seen them live. Steve Albini was responsible for Big Black and Rapeman (also never heard…sorry) prior to Shellac, but most people know him as the producer of Nirvana’s In Utero album. The first point in their favour… the drummer and bassist dressed as Dracula and Frankenstein’s monster respectively, and stayed in character throughout their performance, with bassist man lurching about and groaning while the drummer pulled some awesome Dracula poses. This was a mere decorative frosting on the real attraction which was their cerebral, visceral, post-hardcore, pre-math-rock sound. They are a very tight band who straddle the divide between arty and shouty, clever and dumb, funny yet serious with great panache and I look forward to getting acquainted with their back catalogue. Great…just what I needed…more records to buy.
Daddy Tank
November 3rd, 2008 at 5:26 pm
Total shit ? More like this review is shit, amirite ?
I guess the writer is frustrated that one of Maynard’s bands doesn’t play ATP all the time, i can’t otherwise explain the negative point of view shown here.
This was one of the best line-up in a venue this year; rather funny that the Birmingham troglodytes are regularly being blessed with such a gig as ATP.
Saying that the unknown, Pissed Jeans are of the Neurosis/Isis idiom is perhaps excusable, they never toured with Perfect Circle, so no one’s ever hear of ‘em;
but at least in the case of OM argue something other than: people didn’t like it, they got bored.
Stick to Tool
I’m Paul, and I approve of this message.
!!111!!!11
November 3rd, 2008 at 5:32 pm
Oh Jesus Christ…
November 3rd, 2008 at 5:35 pm
come to think of it, that has to be the most Paul (as in Banica) has written for this site since it started
well done on this mighty and constructive essay, perhaps a little less fail-speak next time though
Oh, and I agree, Om kind of do suck balls live!
November 3rd, 2008 at 6:13 pm
Oh Paul, I was so close to sending you that first email to paul@sittingnow but I can’t now because I’m too upset…. I am interested that you thought it was a negative review…the only band I disliked (intensely) were OM, and frankly, if a band doesn’t engage with the room full of people they happen to be in front of, is that the fault of the band or the people ? A philosophical point to be sure.
November 3rd, 2008 at 7:02 pm
haha
November 3rd, 2008 at 8:29 pm
Pissed Jeans a Neurosis/Isis style assault?? What are you smoking?
November 4th, 2008 at 2:39 am
Yeah, they remind me more of Jesus Lizard or Cow or something like that
November 4th, 2008 at 6:06 pm
[...] Release The Bats review - on the Right Where You Are Sitting Now site. [...]
November 4th, 2008 at 8:49 pm
Daddy Tank’s full bollocks review. Om played a spectacular set, just wasn’t your thing. There were many many pleased fans during their performance. Their new drummer btw was totally outstanding.
November 5th, 2008 at 4:52 pm
Am I supposed to argue with people or should I just accept that the topic is so subjective that there can be no “correct” opinion ? Because I am pretty sure I can draft up some graphs which prove my case.
November 5th, 2008 at 8:13 pm
a review is the opinion of the reviewer. If you didn’t like Om, that’s fine….just opinion…I used to get this a lot when I reviewed for a certain magazine
November 5th, 2008 at 10:54 pm
Some much needed controversy for this website.
A lack of controversy turns an institution into a corporation. And we all know that everything is controversial, even waking up in the morning, or wearing sandals.
It’s all good. fine and dandy.
Did someone mention cows? I love ‘em. Sorry in pig minor is a very consistent album.
yeah
November 5th, 2008 at 11:36 pm
A certain magazine, Ken ? Was it Razzle ?
November 6th, 2008 at 12:11 am
Fiesta actually
November 6th, 2008 at 1:13 am
I knew you had a touch of class about you.
November 6th, 2008 at 1:45 am
of course!
November 6th, 2008 at 1:54 am
Pretense in A major
November 6th, 2008 at 11:17 am
Do you mean “pretence” ? Because pretense wouldn’t mean a lot here in the UK.
November 6th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
wow, that was an open-ended statement! Is he/she dissing the review for being Pretentious, or our blatantly fake convo about Porn mags?
November 6th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
He/She is probably giving us enough rope with which to hang ourselves, but on a more important note …. 20 replies ! It’s practically a message board in here. I only worry that my next review won’t be as controversial and I’ll spiral into depression and impotence while dreaming of the glory days.
November 13th, 2008 at 6:36 am
Pissed Jeans: ‘Neurosis / Isis style assault’ - Is this a joke? If you’re going to reference someone with one of the possible five or six bands that you’ve apparently heard of how about listening to them first.
I see this has already been mentioned but i thought i’d say my piece. Go listen to Cows.
November 13th, 2008 at 6:43 am
P.S. depression and impotence ftw
November 14th, 2008 at 12:53 am
People are getting really het up about this review lol!