The Wonderstuff Live Review

Raigmore Motel - Inverness - 24/11/06

Q - How can you try to explain why most of us thirty-somethings will still part with our hard earned cash to see an old indie band?

A - Because with The Wonderstuff you know it's money well spent.

The Wonderstuff were a band I discovered around the summer of 1988 when I was in a band myself and 'treading the boards' looking for what other breaking bands were doing and I had read some great live reviews about this band in the NME , Sounds and Melody Maker. I bought the 7" vinyl single "A Wish Away" and was blown away with the sound, melodies and riffs, so decided that this was a band I had to see live to see if if they could produce this live.
Well the answer was yes they could and have carried on doing so now for nigh on 20 years or so under different guises and line ups but still giving the same jumping party feeling performance.


With a half full venue on a Friday night out of town no wonder the band didn't do their usual 2 song encore followed by a 3 song encore and armed with a set that never stopped for an hour or so leaving just a few seconds between songs for singer Miles Hunt to draw breath was still a bit special for the old school 'Stuffie' , and many of the old classics still got everybody singing along and remembering a time when The Wonderstuff were the student's darlings.
With a new album to promote there was no doubt that a couple of tracks from it were going to appear on the night and both to me sounded quite good on first hearing but, as an old hand at their gigs as they say 'the old one's are the best'
and some of the songs I'll remember the gig by are "It's Yer Money I'm After Baby", "Golden Green", "Ruby Horse", "A Wish Away", "Caught In My Shadow", "Don't Let Me Down, Gently", "The Size Of A Cow", "Circlesquare" and "Cartoon Boyfriend".
All in all there's no-one better than The Wonderstuff at what they do...

The Charlatans Forever The Singles Tour

The Ironworks - Inverness 20/11/06

A sell out crowd at The Ironworks in Inverness witnessed a performance from The Charlatans that they will not forget for some time. Just to actually see them play the small venue again for me was worth paying a slightly overpriced entrance fee. As the band took to the stage and the music began the crowd began to bounce along to every beat and bass note that was pumping out. Enter Tim Burgess frontman and singer of a band that's been around for the past sixteen years churning out hit after hit and best selling album's one after another. For the full gig everyone in the venue was either dancing and singing along to every song or bouncing down the front with arms aloft in appreciation of a band who have built up a reputation as being a live act aswell as a studio band.


I've lost count over the years just how many times I've seen them live but they always put on a great live show and with a back catalogue bursting at the seams with so many good songs to choose from for the setlist. Here are just a few songs from what I can remember of the gig, "Forever", "Blackened Blue Eyes", "The Only One I Know", "Wierdo", "Crashin' In", "Can't Get Out Of Bed", "One To Another", "North Country Boy", "Just Lookin'", "You're So Pretty", "Love Is The Key", "A Man Needs To Be Told", "Impossible", and the three encore songs "How High", "Indian Rope" and "Sproston Green".

The View Live Review

Raigmore Motel - Inverness 28/09/06

The chant from the crowd that must be ringing out in every town and city the length and breadth of Britain as Dundee's finest The View give another explosive set on a mammoth 49 date tour.
Tuesday 26th September the packed sell out Raigmore Motel, Inverness played host to 4 young lads who give their all in every energetic song they played from the likes of "Streetlights" with lyrics stating "There's a big crowd out tonight, look at the Streetlights", through "The Don", "Posh Boys" and "Skag Trendy" culminating with the singles "Wasted Little D.j's" and "Superstar Tradesman" (surely a dig at all those in every bar around the country telling you not to follow your dream but to "get a trade son and you will go far").
I think they have made the right choice in ditching their trade apprenticeships and going for it full on with an attitude of what's to lose? Your only young once! Because that's what the music business is all about.
More photos are available here The View (Live).

The View, The View, The View are on FIRE!!!

Belladrum Festival - Part 2

Saturday 12th August


With Friday being a great 1st day of the festival looking at the Saturday line up I wasn't really sure about who to watch and decided to just wander about taking in as many different bands I could.

After hearing the buzz surrounding a new band from Dundee called The View they were top of the list. They had to move to a later slot after driving through the night from Liverpool due to the terrorism threats on the airlines. This didn't seem to faze them one little bit as they took the Hothouse Stage by storm and had the crowd bouncing along to great songs like 'Wasted Little D.J's' and 'Posh Boys', and the mellower 'Same jeans' had everyone realising they were witnessing the next big thing. With a 49 date countrywide tour now under way (I'll be at the Raigmore, Inverness 26th Sept & possibly Loopallu Festival, Ullapool 23rd Sept) they are a band that you should make sure you see at the smaller venues and after this blistering set I was looking down the rest of the line up to see which other band could deliver the goods.

Next up on the same stage were a Sheffield band called Tiny Dancers whom I had heard little about except they were a blues/folk/rock style band due to support Richard Ashcroft and Bob Dylan. I think this is another new band due for bigger things in the near future. A great set that had the crowd tapping along to every song and one band I will be keeping an eye open for.

The Automatic on the Garden Stage were always going to be a big crowd puller here because of the What's that coming over the hill? Is it a monster! factor and they had the biggest crowd barring the two headlining bands. They gave an energetic performence which included Kanye West cover version 'Golddigga', new single 'Recover', 'Raoul' and 'The Monster' which had the whole festival rocking.
(see photos at www.reverberation.co.uk)

A walk over to the Grassroots Stage was like walking back through time when I watched The Puppini Sisters. With their reworkings of classics like 'Wuthering Heights' - (Kate Bush), 'Panic' - (The Smiths), 'I Will Survive' - (Gloria Gaynor) and classics like 'Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy' it was a collision between the Andrews Sisters, The Smiths and Hollywood musicals of the 1940s. And it looks great, too!
(see photos at www.reverberation.co.uk)

After making my way back to the Hothouse Stage in my musical T.A.R.D.I.S I promptly returned to the 90's via The Wonderstuff who are in my view still one of the great live bands to see. With two of the original band members sadly no longer with us Miles Hunt and Malcom Treece have found a new 'Bass Thing' in Milo's step brother Mark McCarthy. For me they were a perfect band to be playing at that stage of the festival with all the classics getting an airing before they take them all on tour again. The early favourites like 'Wish Away', 'It's Yer money I'm After Baby' and 'Give Give Give Me More More More' led us through to the likes of 'Golden Green', 'CircleSquare' and 'Don't Let Me Down, Gently' finishing up with an encore of 'Poison'.
(see photos at www.reverberation.co.uk)

Last band up to close the festival is always supposed to be the best and the rest is purely a warm up to this great climax of a live show. So the question with me remains would Embrace have been this band if Echo & the Bunnymen hadn't been playing another festival this night in Ireland?.
Embrace to me are a dull and monotone sounding band live with a wobbly voiced singer who doesn't seem to be able to hold a note, yet they still seem to pull a big entusiastic crowd. Granted they did play some of their better known songs like 'Ashes', 'The Good Will Out', 'Nature's Law', and 'All You Good Good People', but this failed to lift me and left me slightly dissapointed with the ending to a great weekend.

No doubt on the whole the festival has started to build up and is attracting the bigger and better bands which is what we want, but let's try and keep this our festival, nice and easy going, friendly atmosphere and most of all not a ned's day out!

Belladrum Festival - Part 1

After a great weekend at the Belladrum Festival near Beauly, Inverness-shire I thought I'd give my opinion on some of the bands I saw and talk about my highlights. As always it's festivals like these where you go intent on seeing certain bands and stumble upon new favourite bands!

Friday 11th August 2006

Being a big fan of Echo and the Bunnymen to see them returning to Inverness after a long time this was always going to be the one band I would certainly be watching. Off hand I can't remember how many times I have seen them live in many guises over the years but it's well over double figures. As they coolly ambled late onto the main Garden Stage Friday night there was a feeling that this was to be a Bunnymen performance to remember. With lighting and sound problems for Mac the singer/rock god who had definitely had a few ale's he proceeded to berate his soundman throughout what was a run through the classics such as 'The Killing Moon','Bring On The Dancing Horses', 'Rescue','Lips Like Sugar' and 'The Cutter' to name a few with the odd obscure track for the die hard Bunnyman 'The Disease' from 1981 album 'Heaven Up here'.
Overall another Bunnymen classic to add to the memoirs from a band that has been on the scene for over 25 years!

The other main highlight of Friday was seeing The Mystery Jets who were a band I thought I had to see after buying their debut album 'Making Dens'. They were excellent on the Garden Stage on Friday evening and I can see them going on to make quite a big impact soon (and it's not that often a cool new band with the singers dad in it aswell comes along!).
Photos available here www.reverberation.co.uk

Out of the other bands I saw on Friday the main ones to stand out were Forward Russia , from Leeds with a great live show that was loud and in your face and with the titles of their songs being numbers like 'Fourteen' and 'twelve' etc it was quite different, The Rumble Strips , from Devon a 4 piece band that uses a piano, drums, sax and a trumpet instead of the usual set up of guitars and drums were a sort of change to the norm, Culture Clash , the founding member of the Bhundhu Boys a band that was championed by John Peel and Andy Kershaw alike, I stumbled upon this Zimbabwean guitarist and his band on the Grassroots Stage and was taken aback with his 'World Crossover Music', Chris Difford former writing partner of Glen Tilbrook in Squeeze also played on the Grassroots Stage and the parts I heard from his set were very good, with The Young Knives disappointingly having to cancel due to the terrorism alerts at the airports I watched a band called Union Avenue who give you a variety of cover songs from across all genre's of music in the style of Johnny Cash which was a great opener to the festival for me.

Photos available here www.reverberation.co.uk

I'll be putting Photos up on my main site www.reverberation.co.uk
shortly and Belladrum Festival - Part 2 (Saturday 12th August 2006) is also to follow here.

Fatboy Slim - Rock Ness Festival

The photo above was taken whilst the audio bullys were on stage at Dores, Inverness. I chose to put this one on for the view behind the stage and by the time Fat Boy Slim came on the batteries had gone and the pictures I did get at night look a bit too dark. Although there's one decent photo at night where you can see Fat Boy Slim dj-ing suspended in the air above the stage. I'll put the best few up onto the photo's section on the site as soon as I can.
The day started out with shambolic organisation for everyone travelling from Inverness Bus Station, with a line of people 4 or 5 wide from 1 side of the station to the other, when a bus did pull in it became a free for all surge to board it. With this mind everyone new what the score was going to be like leaving and we were not disappointed.
The event itself was ok for someone like me thats not a big dance music fan with a good friendly atmosphere all round. I would imagine that this will now become a yearly event with rumours abound that it will take place over two days with more acts.