Review:
'DEADCUTS/ COLA, JONNY & THE A-GRADES'
'London, Shoreditch, Cargo, 29th January 2014'
- Genre: 'Punk/New Wave'
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Our Rating:
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This was a damn good 3 band line-up that by the names alone has a sort of druggy theme, even without taking a look at the reprobates and hard core gig goers that have shown up on a storm battered evening to see them.
I have to say I think this is the first time I've been to Cargo: a cool Shoreditch venue in some railway arches whose only real failing was very poor beer choices and the very odd policy of putting all the drinks prices up halfway through the evening when the place becomes a "Nightclub" with no discernible difference to the drinks or service. How hip of them.
Still we were there for the bands, so no matter. I have been meaning to see HEALTHY JUNKIES for a while now and have actually missed them a couple of times, showing up at gigs after they had played! It is also a good chance to see Dave Renegade play bass as he is one of those people I see at more gigs than I can count and can't recall seeing him playing before. I'll thank Singer Nina Courson for the set-list help.
They opened with Copycat, a good street punk song that had very good twin vocals between Nina Courson and Phil Honey Jones who was also on guitar. A good start, but the second song Manifesto (all about having the attitude to just say so long and move on and get on with it) really had some force and a bit of Th' Faith Healers vibe to it. Manifesto seemed to confirm they have some really good hard knocks tales to throw at us and to make sure we don't give in. They certainly won't be doing so any time soon.
Resistance was introduced by Nina as being from the band's New Album and from the sounds of it they will be fighting on the front lines of the rock revolution to bring some sanity back to this world of ours. Damn it's gonna be sleazy and dirty as all hell like this tune is. Shine A Line, too, has some very cool lyrics that could almost be a bit Muffs influenced.
Never Want It Again? Well, the title sort of says it all but you still need to know what they never want again. Is it love or drugs or violence or just and escape from the deprivation? Either way the music was starting to sound a bit Alarm meets Poison Girls and needed to get properly down and dirty again. It did with Nice & Sleazy and Trash My Love and Danny Trash. They work together as a triple song of the seedy and seamier side of life. I think there was some proper bile reserved for some of the people in these songs.
They closed with a good and sleazy version of These Boots Are Made For walking that was good but not quite sleazy enough. Either way I'm glad I finally got to see Healthy Junkies and it's worth checking their website for live shows. Go to: Healthy Junkies at Reverbnation for more.
Next on were Jonny Cola & The A-Grades: Jonny Cola & The A-Grades online who don't disappoint live. They opened with Rain Stopped Play. It's got a lot tighter over the last year or so and seemed to have a bit more space to it. Simon Drowner's new, cool, grey-marbled bass really rumbled underneath everything. In The Woods, meanwhile, flew at us like the hybrid Suede meets the Crocketts tune it is.
Johnny was pouting and preening to get us all going on Blow Up. He needn't have worried, though, everyone was into it. Rubber Band was next which was the only song of the set I didn't recognise and thank Mauro for the info and also for the guitar solo he took on it while Johnny was telling us all about how plastic we were as Jez Leather's guitar starting battling with Mauro to shower us all in the shattered plastic!
Favourite ex-45 Halo got quite a good part of the audience singing with them at the chorus. It sounded a lot more honed and they have more edge to it. Marlborough Road is as glammed up as it gets, just as it's time for The Party's Over and the shouts to wake up. Damn, no one is sleeping while they play and they closed with the ever good and histrionic ripples leaving everyone wanting a little more and maybe a new tune or two more from them.
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It was soon time for my second chance to see Deadcuts and this time I thank Jerome Alexandre for the setlist help without which this would be even more inaccurate than my first review of them was!!
Well if the night opened with the Healthy Junkies, then this lot are the unhealthy junkies, though Mark Keds doesn't quite live up to Johnny Thunders for the state he may or may not be in but from the moment they open with Tail Of Voodoo the chemicals are charging through the band's veins with every wrenched bass note from Mark McCarthy as this rips into us in a goth punk way like Joy Division infused with Wasted Youth.
Blood Moon pummels into us and Mark is going on about a city in Isolation and Trevor Sharpe's drums keep pumping at us as the tune develops like a mutant update of the Wolfgang Press' early stuff. Blind Sexx ups the sleaze and dirt levels as they sing about all the sexual Violence as Jerome rips into his guitar with some nice licks to emphasize the nastiness that's going on. Sikx is about as close as they get to sounding anything like The Senseless Things, Mark's old band from back when we were all a bit younger and who knows what McThrills they are chasing as they rampage through the song.
Breaking Up Midnight is a goth nightmare of syrup coughs and chasing away the demons in an early Spear of Destiny meets Rema Rema kind of way. Yes, in the Deadcuts world Dusk Chasers follow on from breaking up midnight as the nights and days blur and the songs have that tight and yet sloppy feel to it down to close on perfection. Just like you would if you were chasing after Speed Sisters, with that ragged slightly ant-sy sound of the addict who needs to drop another bomb soon but has to find the sisters first.
They then brought Beatrice Brown up to sing the next couple of songs and Mark joked about not looking too much like The Kills which I have to say is a fair comparison for how Beatrice works with them on Floods and Ragged Star. Both are sung as if looking up from the gutter they have just crawled out of and are begging for some sort of release that Beatrice may help them all achieve. Her vocals help to make them sound more like a female fronted Gun Club.
From hereon in to the end of the set was a bit of a blur as they went on about the Dead Kid. Could he have just OD'D? The torture and the darkness of the streets is laced into all the songs that need to be heard on an album to let them really penetrate. Perfect Made Practice was like stumbling into the light after a five day binge hoping you mind and body is still intact and you can find your way home. They start to wrap things up with the spiky Without Love: a condition I can't believe any of them really suffer from.
Still the desperation of Caution Exorcists (as they plead and plead of how they are Praying for jail and that may be there only salvation) is a brilliantly dark and twisted song to close with and as with the last time I saw them it's one of the songs that really sticks in my head in a 'properly in the gutter' finish to a great night of sleazy rock. Find out more about them here. Deadcuts on Facebook
We left straight after, so I'm not sure if the other act advertised (Martin Tomlinson) played afterwards or not. Sorry.
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author: simonovitch
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Deadcuts
Jonny Cola
Healthy Junkies
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