I've been meaning to get along to Club FFRUK for a good while now and this Saturday finally made it down to Rooz Studios on the Hoxton borders, a rather bijoux room, normally used as a rehearsal space for this very friendly club run by Segs from the Ruts DC and Tara Rez from The Duel. We arrived just in time to grab a drink before first act Sebastian Reynolds started playing his ironing board of electronics, accompanied by a guitarist and Violinist who both had an array of pedals and effects to play with.
They opened with what I guess was The World a swirling ambient techno piece with samples about the World going to hell in a handcart, the keyboards washed over us, Sebastian got some great noises from his mixer by twiddling wires. Halo Lament saw the guitarist hit pedals that made his guitar sound other worldly and a touch mesmeric. Sleep In My Meadow wasn't as chilled as the title suggest with vocal samples intoning about how they were Fucking With Reality bending beats and transposing key changes with ambient paranoia.
When I Leave My Body was slightly more danceable and the violin seemed to be treble tracked giving it a fuller aspect within the groove they had going on. Shortest day should have been briefer than it was but still conjured up feelings of darkness and foreboding.
How To Move Forwards was all about when things get crazy musically with Sebastian triggering stuff with what looked like a Zapper that seemed to wobble the walls. I'm Cold was the chilliest tune they had, the ambient textures felt like the wind outside. Taken was built around a solid groove and what the guitarist was doing as he set off effects from his pedals before they closed with Cascade that mutated and re-arranged various waterfall sounds within the keyboards and violin swirling through the room.
Next on were Sabatta who I wanted to see live since reviewing the bands How To Get Even album in 2023, Sabatta are Yinka Oyewole playing his Afro-comb guitar and effects and backing tracks who opened with Times an angry rant against the madness of the times we live in, Yinka set off all sorts of effects but the core of his gritty guitar real drove things on. You Got It Bad built around the backing track and the delays he was triggering on the guitar parts made this feel very full and powerful. Highlight of the set was his song about Immigration the brilliantly witty Foreign Muck that makes fun out of all the racists idiots who still eat Curry and Pizza and enjoy foreign beers etc set to a diamond hard riffing tune, making clear we all love stuff from varied cultures, we all love Foreign Muck no matter where we are from.
Can't Keep Yourself is full of crunchy guitar that sounded double tracked with an intensity to make clear how hard it is to keep your head above water these days. Known For It was ferocious sounding screed against the insanity of how normal people are treated in this dark world of ours, over super heavy distorted guitar. I think the next song was Wandering whose colossal riff slammed into the backing tracks, drums pounding at our ears before Yinka closed with Anomaly that both describes his position as a Nigerian playing heavy rock and the Anomaly of how certain people escape punishment no matter what, it was a good way to end a very cool set.
Next on were Lost In Space (Southside Skull Rockers) a Sarf Lahndan anarcho squat punk four piece, whose singer Debs announced their arrival by announcing We Suck several times over as they opened with a ballsy, brassy song of that name, that was in our faces and great fun. Debs ranted at us between songs sounding like she's just smoked 40 senior service before going on, also reminding me of Vi Subversa while ranting about the Government and how corrupt and awful they are, the very familiar looking guitarist Dave was playing a great low-slung riff to drive them on. Alienation is something we all feel in these times and the brutal drumming and sober bass really drove them on, with Debs scattergun vocals nailing how much everyone at this club really feel like outsiders from the current world.
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Get A Life was Deb on full on strutting punk nightmare, making clear that you need to go grab life by both hands and not let go, they were highly entertaining even if I was dying to hear them cover Take The Toys From The Boys or Persons Unknown, this would more than do. Mother Gun was super angry and of course Rev Sam's question of if any of us had ever been to Sarf Lahndan were greeted with shouts of no, what kind of people did he think we were. They closed with Shut The Fuck Up an anthem to get all the idiots to shut up and let the freaks take over and bring about a saner more fun and free society, they are loads of fun live and well worth seeing.
Tonight's headliners (The Original) Ruby Throat are the band of that name that originally opened for Ian Dury back in the 90's. They don't use chainsaws preferring cello, trumpet, saxophone, accordion and drums along with two singers. I guess they opened with That's The Way It Is that had a great cello led ska rebetika edge to it, Animal really grooved and the sax and trumpet lifted them up with the accordion driving on the rhythm.
They introduced the band's latest single Beaten Around The Head that this was the launch show for, as being about the super-rich idiots we all want to beat around the head, the vocal interplay between the male and female vocalists worked really well with the dark scratchy cello riff. Free Palestine was asking for sanity in the most insane part of the planet, how can we bring about a sensible two state solution, while making sure this was still super danceable. Been There Done That was a bouncy anthem for a life well lived. They introduced the next song as Polowoh or something like that, it was an adrenaline rush of Accordion and sax intensity that got most of the audience bouncing along with them.
I Made A Common Error seemed to be the normal one that you thought governments were here to make the world a better place, instead you have more chance of Cello and trumpet led bands taking over the world. They closed with Bullseye that was introduced as being about a man and his dog, so was clearly about Bill Sykes from Oliver Twist and not about Jim Bowen that was claimed by someone I talked to afterwards, it was a great song about the duality of the relationship between a cruel master and his loyal dog and brought to a close a great fun four band line up, just leaving Segs on the laptop of steel selecting more top tunes.
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