Skindred/ Victory Pill/ Strawberry Blondes
Live at the London Scala, 20/07/07
By James Willcock
Unfortunately, for reasons completely out of my control, I arrived at the stage of the Scala only minutes before the first band of the evening, Strawberry Blondes, finished their set, and as a consequence I cant really tell you much about the band. All I can really tell you is they play a ska influenced kind of punk, i.e. they have the bouncing, happy, bass line driven song style, but stop short of including a full brass section. Other than that, I have absolutely nothing to say about them, the few minutes of performance I saw thoroughly failed to make any kind of impression on me one way or the other.
Next up were Victory Pill, who are worthy of note as they have a pedigree- the band was started by Jim Davies, who has played guitar for both Pitchshifter (as much a band these days as they are the question, "Have they broken up, or are they just between labels? Because they're still playing live shows!") and The Prodigy. After initially working solo and instrumentally, he recruited Kieron Pepper on bass, and both started work on vocal parts for the songs. The line up was rounded out the addition of Jason Bowld, who also plays for Pitchshifter, on drums, and Paul Fletcher on guitar. So, with a band half made up of Pitchshifter members, you would (at least, I was) be hoping they could manage something decent.
Unfortunately, they didnt. Apparently theyve worked with industrial and dance producers on their studio material, and the production style carried through to the live show- very bass heavy, a fair amount of drums, and pretty much nothing else. On the upside, the bass lines were plenty thumping, but as the music lacked the speed of a dance track (pitching somewhere around medium-slow), there wasnt much dancing to be done. Instead, all this really served to do was make the guitar and vocals almost and the keyboards completely inaudible in the mix. However, I still got the impression that, on all three counts, I wasnt missing much. The vocals in particular, even if they were pushed up in the mix, would have still sounded weak, as even with the bass to contend with, they sounded like the vocal work of two professional musicians who are amateur vocalists.
Meanwhile, the song structures were simple and workman-like with their general, straight ahead, A to B feel, meaning that, combined with the afore mentioned poor sound mix and the less than zealous stage show, the whole experience was, in a word, boring. I dont think this was a rare opinion- both of my friends there that evening agreed with me, the room was far from than bouncing, and the applause at the end of songs was never much more than polite- everyone, like me, seemed to just be biding their time until Skindred came on.
Which, in due time they did, and, as usual at their live shows, immediately grabbed the attention of the crowd, and didnt let go until they left the stage. Im not going to pretend to be an impartial reviewer here- this was the 9th time Ive seen Skindred live, and Im glad to say that, this gig included, Ive loved every minute.
A key element in elevating their live shows above average is the performance of vocalist Benji Webbe. Aside from being a talented and, possibly more importantly, unique vocalist, he is everything a band needs in a front man- as energetic as a surge of electricity whilst performing, with a bravado lacking from many modern rock and metal front men. In particular, the talking to the crowd, and generally working them up as much as possible, furthers the enjoyment of the show as much as possible. The band emphasise this, by frequently stopping songs before the start of the first verse or before the last section of the song, during which time Benji does his best to incite the crowd to newer levels of energy.
The show was also a treat, as they played material from their new album, Roots Rock Riot (out on the 22nd of October), including Rat Race, which has been doing the rounds on the band MySpace. Despite this, all the standard live favourites were brought out, including Nobody, Selector, Bruises and one of the best songs for crowd participation this side of Iron Maiden, Pressure, before closing with Babylon. However, this was not the best Skindred live show I have ever seen- Benji no longer plays with his air raid siren or sample loaded keyboard. Although these were never features of the songs themselves, messing around with them in between always added to the unique sense of fun at their gigs. Also, as I have stated before, the set list is always fairly similar (although that should change come the release of the new album), and I always live in hope that they will bring out a few of the old classics that, inexplicably, never made it onto the Babylon album- they played Brainkilla last time I saw them, which made me very happy indeed, but its been an awfully long time since I heard Target, Boom It Up and the like. The final gripe I have is that, despite the doors opening at 6:30, the set was still under an hour long, with no encore, meaning we were kicked out sometime around 10pm- Id been hoping for markedly longer set.
However, all in all, a fun time was had by all, and all that remains is to await their new album, hope that the major label release doesnt mark a major sell out (I fear that the bands less aggressive side could be over emphasised to sell it to little kids, which would be a crying shame, Skindred have so much more to offer than radio friendly unit shifting kiddie rock) and await their return to these shores from the tour of the US for their next gig- I fancy making it an even 10.
Live at the London Scala, 20/07/07
By James Willcock
Unfortunately, for reasons completely out of my control, I arrived at the stage of the Scala only minutes before the first band of the evening, Strawberry Blondes, finished their set, and as a consequence I cant really tell you much about the band. All I can really tell you is they play a ska influenced kind of punk, i.e. they have the bouncing, happy, bass line driven song style, but stop short of including a full brass section. Other than that, I have absolutely nothing to say about them, the few minutes of performance I saw thoroughly failed to make any kind of impression on me one way or the other.
Next up were Victory Pill, who are worthy of note as they have a pedigree- the band was started by Jim Davies, who has played guitar for both Pitchshifter (as much a band these days as they are the question, "Have they broken up, or are they just between labels? Because they're still playing live shows!") and The Prodigy. After initially working solo and instrumentally, he recruited Kieron Pepper on bass, and both started work on vocal parts for the songs. The line up was rounded out the addition of Jason Bowld, who also plays for Pitchshifter, on drums, and Paul Fletcher on guitar. So, with a band half made up of Pitchshifter members, you would (at least, I was) be hoping they could manage something decent.
Unfortunately, they didnt. Apparently theyve worked with industrial and dance producers on their studio material, and the production style carried through to the live show- very bass heavy, a fair amount of drums, and pretty much nothing else. On the upside, the bass lines were plenty thumping, but as the music lacked the speed of a dance track (pitching somewhere around medium-slow), there wasnt much dancing to be done. Instead, all this really served to do was make the guitar and vocals almost and the keyboards completely inaudible in the mix. However, I still got the impression that, on all three counts, I wasnt missing much. The vocals in particular, even if they were pushed up in the mix, would have still sounded weak, as even with the bass to contend with, they sounded like the vocal work of two professional musicians who are amateur vocalists.
Meanwhile, the song structures were simple and workman-like with their general, straight ahead, A to B feel, meaning that, combined with the afore mentioned poor sound mix and the less than zealous stage show, the whole experience was, in a word, boring. I dont think this was a rare opinion- both of my friends there that evening agreed with me, the room was far from than bouncing, and the applause at the end of songs was never much more than polite- everyone, like me, seemed to just be biding their time until Skindred came on.
Which, in due time they did, and, as usual at their live shows, immediately grabbed the attention of the crowd, and didnt let go until they left the stage. Im not going to pretend to be an impartial reviewer here- this was the 9th time Ive seen Skindred live, and Im glad to say that, this gig included, Ive loved every minute.
A key element in elevating their live shows above average is the performance of vocalist Benji Webbe. Aside from being a talented and, possibly more importantly, unique vocalist, he is everything a band needs in a front man- as energetic as a surge of electricity whilst performing, with a bravado lacking from many modern rock and metal front men. In particular, the talking to the crowd, and generally working them up as much as possible, furthers the enjoyment of the show as much as possible. The band emphasise this, by frequently stopping songs before the start of the first verse or before the last section of the song, during which time Benji does his best to incite the crowd to newer levels of energy.
The show was also a treat, as they played material from their new album, Roots Rock Riot (out on the 22nd of October), including Rat Race, which has been doing the rounds on the band MySpace. Despite this, all the standard live favourites were brought out, including Nobody, Selector, Bruises and one of the best songs for crowd participation this side of Iron Maiden, Pressure, before closing with Babylon. However, this was not the best Skindred live show I have ever seen- Benji no longer plays with his air raid siren or sample loaded keyboard. Although these were never features of the songs themselves, messing around with them in between always added to the unique sense of fun at their gigs. Also, as I have stated before, the set list is always fairly similar (although that should change come the release of the new album), and I always live in hope that they will bring out a few of the old classics that, inexplicably, never made it onto the Babylon album- they played Brainkilla last time I saw them, which made me very happy indeed, but its been an awfully long time since I heard Target, Boom It Up and the like. The final gripe I have is that, despite the doors opening at 6:30, the set was still under an hour long, with no encore, meaning we were kicked out sometime around 10pm- Id been hoping for markedly longer set.
However, all in all, a fun time was had by all, and all that remains is to await their new album, hope that the major label release doesnt mark a major sell out (I fear that the bands less aggressive side could be over emphasised to sell it to little kids, which would be a crying shame, Skindred have so much more to offer than radio friendly unit shifting kiddie rock) and await their return to these shores from the tour of the US for their next gig- I fancy making it an even 10.
