SNUB II @ Lomax - 03.02.12

(Image: The Temps)

  The second outing of the wittily-named “Snub Fest” was always going to be a contentious one.  Entirely run by, promoted by and ultimately championed by former Masque promoter Gemma Smith, the three-night festival was either going to sink or swim.  Luckily, the acts that performed on its penultimate night were the equivalent of your Michael Phelps and Tom Daley – I blended in to the crowd and enjoyed a bloody good night of music…

  After an admittedly clumsy start, no doubt due to an irresponsible sound engineer, the night kicked off an hour and half-or-so later than it should have.  But not to worry – these things happen, and The Fall of Kings took over the stage in a confident manner.  Self described as an “epic rock” band, they certainly lived up to their name with the eclectic mix of powerhouse guitars, excellent weathered vocals, a brilliant rhythm section and the surprise of the night – violinist!  The songs they played were very good.  Their tracks had a sense of urgency, befitting of their self-description, but the violin added a layer of unsurpassed beauty which blew me away.  The last track of the night (forgive me for not remembering the name) was incredible – the intersecting melodies were very complementary of each other and it had a killer chorus that I was singing for the rest of the evening.

  Beer flowing, I watched the second band of the night!  After another long wait due to a technical problem with one of the keyboards, The Last Gambados quickly gained my trust with their Pogues-ish set that wouldn’t have felt out of place in an Irish bar.  With shanty-like melodies, the band was huge – backed by a powerful brass section, the band ploughed through an excellent set with many catchy numbers.  Lead singer/keys player Phil Mason was a revelation with an incredibly strong voice, no doubt roughened by many flagons of ale.  I thoroughly enjoyed the band.

  Next up was the original headliners The Temps – you may have seen their many stickers pasted around the city centre.  They are a band I knew very little about beforehand and I do not know why they were downgraded from their slot, but if I’m being honest I’m not entirely surprised with their relegation.  It wasn’t really my cup of tea.  If I had to define their genre it would be “noise rock” or “hardcore punk”.  The songs (such as “Bleach”) were very dissonant and loud, no doubt owing to their insane amount of FX pedals!  Their onstage presence was quite electric.  The front man (Facebook tells me his name is Joseph) engaged in some shocking behaviour, gyrating in a self-mutilating way that reminded me of a combination of Morrisey, Ian Curtis and Rage Against The Machine.  His onstage exorcism culminated with him wrapping the microphone lead around his neck and throwing the mic stand to the floor.  Excellent viewing, but the music was mostly forgettable.

(Image: The Temps)

  Finally, after a short changeover, White Heat took centre stage around half past eleven.  Due to the runover in time, the room had about twenty people left in it.  Admittedly, I had not heard the band before that night (I missed their set at the original Snub Fest at The Masque) but the performance they gave showed me that they thoroughly and absolutely deserved their headline slot.  In just half an hour, they absolutely blew me away with their astonishing set.  Their songs were the perfect blend of catchy popular music and technically complex compositions and riffs.  Having just released their album Prima Donna, the band were obviously on a high and were having the time of their lives on stage.  Andrew Fisher, the band’s lead singer and keyboard player has incredible personality and talent and he wrapped the room around his little finger in a matter of minutes.  Synth-centric songs such as “Judgement Day” were incredible with many sonic textures.  “War” in particular was a highlight for me, giving the entire band a chance to show off including an excellent bass solo section by the band’s Sam Jenkins which had the crowd cheering. 

 The band were amazingly tight.  Guitarist Sean Osgood was brilliant, pulling off some amazing lead riffs and solos with a virtuoso performance.  Drummer Ben Fullerton was an absolute machine, blasting his way through the set with an intelligent and loud style that reminded me of the very best of Muse and Coldplay.  The audience loved them; some people engaging in the only drunken dancing that I saw all night.  Their ‘apparent’ last song in the set was the superb “We’ll Always Have Rome” which I could easily see being played in a stadium setting.  After they finished, the audience roared for an encore (the only one of the night) and the band bemusedly came back on to smash through a cover of Maroon Five’s “This Love”.  They were so impressive and I honestly think they have big, big things in store for them.

  I left with a huge feeling of pride in the Liverpool music scene.  Snub II was just what the city needed following the abysmal closures of the Masque, the CUC and Mojo, and the bands pretty much blew me away.  Gemma Smith is a credit to the industry and she pulled the event off very well for her young age!

Words: Alan Marsh

Links:

WHITE HEAT

http://www.facebook.com/whiteheatband

THE TEMPS

https://www.facebook.com/TempsTempsTemps

THE LAST GAMBADOS
https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Last-Gambados/121040527936867

THE FALL OF KINGS

https://www.facebook.com/thefallofkings

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