Why?
Two of my buddies, the bon viveurs behind Kodaly’s Code, are soon headed for Scandinavian climbs. On their holiday, they plan to 1. Pick up a few DJ sets, and 2. Chirps some Scandifemales (see: 1). Last night, WhoMadeWho, a three-piece Disco-Indie-Electro band from Copenhagen were playing in London, and as some sort of reccie, Kodaly's decided to head down and schmoose. My ladyfriend and I, jealous of their philandering ways, decided to tag along and be cool by association.
Two of my buddies, the bon viveurs behind Kodaly’s Code, are soon headed for Scandinavian climbs. On their holiday, they plan to 1. Pick up a few DJ sets, and 2. Chirps some Scandifemales (see: 1). Last night, WhoMadeWho, a three-piece Disco-Indie-Electro band from Copenhagen were playing in London, and as some sort of reccie, Kodaly's decided to head down and schmoose. My ladyfriend and I, jealous of their philandering ways, decided to tag along and be cool by association.
The VenueCargo is one of the Shoreditch darlings. It has been there for yonks. Along with 93 Feet East, it is something of a default venue if you’re on an East London jaunt- i.e. you can semi-guarantee that there will be decent music there, most of the time. But being one of the oldest venues in the area, it falls into the trap of seeming a little predictable, and not particularly bleeding edge when compared to the new ventures around Hackney and Dalston. That said, it’s still a goodie, and the programming rarely falters. In the bar-saturated Great Eastern-Old Street-Shoreditch High Street triangle, the club has been converted from two redbrick railway arches, one of which is an excellent gig space with a great sound system. Crucially, the capacity is in the middle ranges: small enough to feel intimate, and big enough to get rowdy.
What they look like
WhoMadeWho are what I like to call a Hyphen Band: a band that straddles more than two musical genres. Pick n' mix pop, if you will. The Noughties, perhaps, has been the decade of the Hyphen Band, a trend that you can backdate to Soulwax’s 2 Many DJs albums, where Dolly Parton and Destiny's Child were mixed with filthy house and punk. Since then there seems to be a new one every week: rockabilly-pop-punk; indie-electro-house; classical-dubstep-folk-techno (ok, I made that one up, but you get the point). Anyway, one of the inevitable trappings of the hyphen band is that they think they are the coolest goddam things around, because they are just so musically aware, you know? In this evolutionary moment...they are the fittest...and they will survive! He who has the most overlapping circles in his musical Venn diagram wins!Anyway, WhoMadeWho are none of the above. If anything, they seem to try pretty hard to look like they don’t take themselves too seriously. Indeed, the drummer is in a lycra skeleton suit that extends to a hood over his bald head. Imagine Freddy Ljungberg as a gimp. The bass player and guitarist are also both in lycra jumpsuits, the former with a frilly satin shirt over the top, the latter with a floppy smock. They seem to be playing along with the resurgence of Ziggy Stardust-esque, camped-up on-stage extravagance. MGMT are in on the act too- they recently appeared on French TV dressed as pilgrims, surrounded by pug dogs, canapés and, Segway personal transporters.
The guitarist (pictured, above) deserves a special mention. He's a funny looking chap: with thick wavy blonde hair and a moustache. He looks two parts Dutch porn star, one part hillbilly roadie.
What they sound likeTough one. Ok, start by imagining a slightly sleazy version of Jonny Cash, with the forced, simplistic crooning of Gary Numan or Interpol. Then add a thumping two-note disco bassline (imagine the bass part at the beginning of Standing in the Way of Control, but a lot deeper), and a tight 16-beat drum line. It’s a bit like hearing Ian Curtis singing along to a Blondie track. Then imagine the bass shifting to become a little more psychedelic funk, with bass lines that sound a bit like The Who or The Doors, with harmonised falsetto singing over the top. The closest overall match, probably, is Soulwax or LCD. However, the thing I enjoyed the most was WhoMadeWho’s inclination to rock out, switching the guitar to more electric grungy sounds from time to time. Their version of Bobby Bennassi’s Satisfaction, for example, replaces the synth line with a rocky guitar riff, and it brought the house down.
Conclusion
As you can probably tell, the music is a heady mix. And with such permutation, it is easy to forget to put a show on. Often a band will be working such wonders with the twiddly nobs and guitar effects that they spend too much time concentrating, and not enough time performing. Not these guys. In fact, they are probably the most engaging band I have seen in ages- able to make excellent music whilst throwing themselves around in their lycra suits. This, my friends, is a Hyphen Band who can pull it off live. I imagine this is because they probably started live- rather than reluctantly converted PC music into real music. All in all, this gig delivered probably the most important thing that live music can do: fun.
1 comment:
ANTI AMERICAN SWINE!!!!
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