Taking their name from Skip Spence’s unhinged opus, and looking like a bunch of funky thirtysomethings a la Doves, OAR offer a woody brew of folk psychedelia with an urban edge. Beautiful harmonies and judicious bongo bashing from Grand Central and Fat City Club promoter Brendan Williams accompany singer John Heald’s tales of love and loss in the city.
Post-performance, bassist Alan Slack belied his moniker by engaging in energetic self-promotion, plastering a supportive crowd with flyers.
Is that a pork pie hat I see before me? It certainly is, and MOUNTAINEERS’ adventure in pop cultural headwear doesn’t end with frontman Alex Germains’ two-tone topping – drummer Tomas Kelar is sporting a rather fetching Lopez-style sun-visor.
Musically as well as sartorially, Mountaineers’ draw on disparate sources including Krautrock, Flaming Lips-style symphonic pop, French disco and the punk funk of Gang of Four and The Pop Group.
Germains’ charmingly diffident between-song banter contrasts with lyrics that are often full of bile. Hatless keyboardist Ceri James redeems himself by making good use of the much-abused vocoder, providing an effective counterpoint to Germains' often-soulful vocals.
As a skunky fug envelops the Hop and Grape, THE BANDITS stroll on stage to Jonathan Richman’s "Egyptian Reggae", a suitable intro for a band who prove to be much more than the sum of their influences.
Quite simply, the cosmic scouse pretenders to the throne are blisteringly good tonight. With hacking cough and hooded eyes indicating herbal inspiration, singer John positively vibrates with the music, almost speaking in tongues in between vocals, his face a mess of conflicting twitches.
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Bassist Scott (who looks alarmingly like 70’s ‘comic actor’ Robin Askwith) and drummer Swee drive things along in a garage style while guitarists Richie (impossibly cool) and Gary (most amusing), together with organist Tony (Fidel Castro) mess with our collective head.
The band rumble through favourites old and new including first single "The Warning", anti-propaganda epic "How Can You Believe?" (with a crowd-confusing, band-amusing Gimme Some Lovin’ false start) and the frankly mind-blowing "Two-step Rock", encoring with a coruscating cover of the MC5’s "Looking At You."
On the bus home, I overheard a group of punters dissing the Bandits together with fellow travellers The Coral – with accusations of lack of originality to the fore. To me this misses the point. These bands have never been shy about naming their influences – they take elements of some of the finest music of the last forty years (garage rock, Love-style baroque psychedelia, Beefheart/Zappa, ska, dub etc) and mash them up with skill, enthusiasm and humour – long may they keep stealing.
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