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It’s cold up north. It’s also cold in Sheffield, also, it snows heavily in Sheffield when you forget to take a jacket with you, damn erratic British weather. But more on that later. The first thing you need when you enter a venue and you’re freezing cold, other than a cup of cocoa, is a blast of hot, searing, brutal metal, provided courtesy of probably Britain’s finest and tightest metal band Mirimar Disaster, if they were American, they’d be on the front of Rock-Sound right now, not just the Exposure sections. Coupled with disturbing visual treats from the Media Lounge Sheffield based Mirimar’s short set shows how to properly scare your Granny on those annoying trips when you’d rather be in bed or at a gig, Trivium are shown for the weak, silent kitten’s farts they are compared to them. Time to feed my cat.
Apparently Static chose all the supports for this tour, if so, they have varied taste, which shows in the music they make, I like that in a band. Next up is Warp label’s Chris Clark and his table of various drum machines with a sharp performance of glitchy drum ‘n’ bass, V festival could never be this eclectic and Warp show that they are slowly atoning for past errors (plural would be misleading, I have a vat of boiling chip oil ready for when Warp want to fully right that wrong). Unfortunately for Mr Clark, he drags his set on ever so slightly in front of a mainly unappreciative crowd and he doesn’t really do justice to his outstanding releases so far, even the visuals used seem a bit lacklustre. Shame.
This time last year they were playing the Pride of Leicester pub (surprisingly in Leicester) in front of 50 people, at the speed S-S-Sixty Five are going, they’ll have conquered Europe, Japan and the US by the summer, be headlining Reading & Leeds festivals in August before a big cities only arena tour of Britain, they’ll have split up by October, the Stadium Reunion Tour will take place in the winter and the 25 year anniversary edition of Fall Of Math will be released next April. It’s a little known fact, but even the music they play is actually a kind of slow, peaceful, Tortoise/Boards Of Canada affair but at 65 speeds, it sounds to the mortal humans in the crowd like the perfect match of punk and electronica which WILL get you moving everything. 65’s stunning set (backed by breath taking Media Lounge visuals) contrive to destroy all you know about live music and how it should be played, the mass of guitars and beats can and do only finally come to rest with the film score-esque set closer Radio Protector played in all it’s heart stopping beauty with poignant messages and info about Climate Change displayed behind them.
On the train journey home, reading one of the many leaflets I picked up about Climate Change from the 65 merch-table, I pondered how a band with no lyrics managed to honestly drive home a serious message in a way that 20 charity singles and however many hypocritical Live8s couldn’t. Here’s hoping they get the message across to world sooner rather than later. Before Paul Wolinski’s first solo album next July of course.
Ali Safavi |
| Coding: Darren Burrows