This was a great 4 band heavy rock bill that made us trek over to Maryland Point, for my first visit to the Cart & Horse pub in 40 years, as I have vague memories of drinking there in the early 80's when it was somewhere we could get served while still under 18, of course the Cart & Horses is legendarily the birthplace of Iron Maiden and the pub now serves Iron Maidens range of Beer and wine.
They have recently tarted the pub up and converted the basement into a great small gig room. We arrived in time for the last 3 songs of Meansteeds set, which was a shame because as ever they were rocking like the rifftastic band they always are live, Speed Queen was as heavy and tight as could be.
Matt Dorkings appears to have even more hair than the last time we saw them, his super crunchy riff really allowed Alison Curry plenty of room to solo on the new song about partying, she went and solo'd on the speaker cabinet and manged to knock her beer flying while getting back down. They closed with Engage The Rage that had another crunching great riff to make sure we regretted missing the start of the set.
Next on were Trophies Of Man who for our money should have been on first, the 4 piece opened with what I guess was I Can't See Now the bands frontman Flash fulfilled our guess to how he would sound, we were close in guessing he was a skinnier charity shop Vince Neil, with just enough scream in his vocals. Reptile was a decent hard rocker as Danny riffed away on guitar.
Back Away was possibly what some in the audience did, while Lee on bass did his best to not look like a snooker player. Flash lived up to all the cliches he could on The Supernatural, it was good fun hard rock. Dark Swing had some good slide playing from Danny as the lyrics got increasingly sleazy.
Inside didn't appear to be about being banged up but had some solid riffing and good yelps and screams in the vocals, before they closed with Devil On Your Back that has a good sleaze ridden edge to it.
Next on were She Made Me Do It who last time I saw them Shaheena Dax was still playing keyboards, this time she was on bass, with Will Crewsdon as ever on guitar and effects, with I think the same drummer they had last time I saw them. Of course Will and Shaheena are both also in Rachel Stamp and he plays guitar in among others Gaye Bikers On Acid, Adam & The Ants, The Selector and Scant Regard.
They opened with a song about Falling Apart which is the last thing their live sound does as they were super taut with Shaheena's bass a perfect steady foil to Will's crunchy playing. Tonight or whatever the song was, saw a cool sample being built over with Wills guitar adding texture as well as decent riffage.
Symptomatic had great interplay between Shaheena and Will. They introduced Summer Time Song as a new song that was hoping for some real summer weather. Artificial had a great dark pop edge while being aimed at all the far too Artificial people they meet.
|
Strangest Reason had some amazing guitar gymnastics while sounding very catchy indeed. Shaheena was singing about all the Lies while playing a great dirty bassline, Sleepless In Detroit stood out in its dark majesty, they closed with one more tune from the latest Artificial EP although I'm not sure which song it was, either way this was a really good set.
Then finally it was time for Syteria who are Jax Chambers from Girlschool's current band, alongside Julia and Pablo Calvi and Steph Dawson. They opened with Guilty and right from the start were great fun and totally rocking, Julia made it clear I'm All Woman as she tore it up on guitar almost as much as Jax was. I think Breaking Through was next as they made most of us smile as they were clearly having loads of fun onstage still Chasing The Dream, whatever that might be.
Julia put her guitar down and picked up her Tambourine during It Hit Me that like most of the set I can easily sing along too, the Syteriaworld album has really wormed its way into my head now. Plastic Fantastic had some great faces and poses form Julia while Steph's bassline drove things on.
Raise Your glasses got most of us to raise a glass to them as they sped through this anthem to the demon alcohol. Julia strapped her guitar back on for what I put down as Angels, they then played what is now a crucial anthem Pause For Peace a song that needs to be played everywhere, so stop all the fighting and Pause For Peace.
Reflection had a cool guitar solo from Jax who as always kept things short and to the point. E.M.P.T.Y. was back to one guitar so Julia could maraud across the stage all the better to get us all going. I think it was Remember Me next with Julia back playing guitar as all the things we need to remember them by were made clear.
Monsters is such a great song especially when played live like this it was great fun while taking aim at all the evil monsters screwing the world up. They closed with a raucous version of Make Some Noise that made certain they would be called back for an encore, they threw loads of sweets into the audience at the start of Halloween, that let Julia scream at us all while getting several audience members to also scream into the microphone ending a great fun set. I look forward to seeing them at Rebellion Festival next month.
|
