GIG NUMBER SIXTY-NINE
Who
When they finally did drag their lazy selves onstage it was to a nice surprise. They weren't amazing, but were a solid, well-playing band making a racket worth getting out of the house to hear! They looked like they might be stars with a very hairy singer and a guy in a red baseball cap rocking out in centre stage. They were astonishingly loud and the lightshow was intense, although to the point where it was just hurting our eyes rather than improving the show! But whenever music is loud and fast and with little variety boredom sets in astonishingly quickly (hello "heavy" music genres, I'm looking at you!) so I was very pleased that they left the stage after 30 minutes rather than boring us with a longer set. The crowd seemed to enjoy it and I definitely felt this was worth the gamble but whether they can make it or not is another matter. Can they come out with a few great individual songs without going down the most obvious path of sounding like The Vines or Nirvana? Are they yet another act destined to obscurity and to join the countless examples of bands that the NME have failed to talk about with due PERSPECTIVE? My feeling was that it'd be amazing if they ever make it bigger than 80s Matchbox did, so take a look at my 2008 review to see how it panned out for them!
Mark: 7.0/10
Nine Black Alps
Support
The Redwalls
Where
Manchester Hop And Grape
When
9th May 2005
Price
£7.00
Who with
Matt
Position
In the middle
Comments
A decision to try and "get down" with the new bands seemed quite reasonable considering that they are cheaper to see and, in the current musical climate, seemed to have a terrifying chance of actually making it, giving me a chance to casually say I saw them early on and they were nothing special then and still aren't now! Seeing Razorlight supporting Suede stands as my finest current example, and the list I reeled off at the start of my Electric Six review above reveals all the bands I've now missed a chance to see before they grow to obscene popularity. NME had decided Nine Black Alps were the great hopes of Mancunian music so I thought £7.00 for someone who could make it big (and a cheap night out regardless) was quite reasonable. I went out with absolutely zero knowledge of the band thus full of reservations that I was letting my standards slip and arrived late, got a beer and saw The Redwalls who I believe were OK but due to the month it has taken me to write this review I have to consign them to support band non-entities who did nothing interesting enough for me to remember them! We moved forwards slightly for the longest, most tedious wait for a band to come on since Primal Scream as they let the lights go down and the DJ stop but took a full FIFTEEN MINUTES before bothering to come onstage and start playing.
