Alcest and Anathema in Glasgow

Once more it's a trip to the North West for the first gig since Green Man and surprisingly the first proper gig of the year. A new venue as well - The Garage - to see Alcest and Anathema, both bands I've seen before. This would be the fourth time for Alcest and the second for Anathema. Another one of those early starts, Alcest would be on-stage at 6.45. We arrived early and decided to head down the front, the venue was about half full, maybe 300 people in. Alcest arrived and launched in to Kodama, it should have been a great start but the sound was awful... were we too close? maybe. Things never really improved and it was only during the quieter moments (Autre Temps) that the vocals were discernible - the drums and bass were overpowering pretty much everything, even the guitars sounded lost. Have to say it was something of a disappointment, enjoyable but not great. Such a poor sound didn't bode well for Anathema who rely on clear vocals and harmonies for their sound.

Rory and I wandered to the bar at the back of the venue for the obligatory pint of Joker IPA and a Red Stripe, drinks in hand we decided to head to the balcony for Anathema. After what seemed like a long wait they came on-stage and immediately ran in to problems as Vincent Cavanagh's (lead vocals and guitar) rig just packed in. Ahh the joys of a first night on tour! Much scurrying around the stage from their guitar tech eventually coming up with a 'fix'. Opening with San Francisco off new album The Optimist Untouchable Parts 1 & 2 - one of my favourite tracks by them, they'd sorted everything out and went on to play a great set - you can view the setlist here.

This clip of Anathema performing Thin Air is from this summers Download Festival.

 

So why did Anathema sort out the sound issues and Alcest not, I guess it's got to be down to your sound engineer. Perhaps a supporting band don't have the funds to take their own engineer on tour with them and they rely on the headliners or venues engineer. I'd suggest after this experience that a band should make finding a good sound engineer a top priority. There's no point in having a great set of songs if your audience can't hear them properly. I don't expect (or want) a replication of the studio sound but with the technology available poor sound at a gig isn't really acceptable. Alcest have been getting better and better with each album and gig, but this one I feel let them down. It won't stop me seeing them again though. Hopefully next time they'll headline and their sound engineer will know his stuff!

Some great Prog!

Midlake at the Playhouse July 10th, part of the Mouth of the Tyne Festival and I have to say an inspired booking by who ever organised the event. It's not often I get to see the same band twice in the same year, but I'd seen Midlake earlier at the start of the Antiphon tour back in February, so it was going to be interesting to see how the sound has developed. It's definitely fuller sounding and is all the better for it, good tracks on the album have become excellent live vehicles for the band, in fact I'd now say Antiphon is my fave album by them.



September 22nd, Anathema at Newcastle's O2 Academy this time with the missus who had dismissed the last band we saw together, Midlake – the Glasgow gig, as not being Rock 'n' Roll enough for her.

We caught a few songs from support band Mothers Cake and I'm afraid they didn't impress.

There seemed an interminable wait while the stage was made ready for Anathema, probably due to them being moved to the smaller hall, maybe a little over 200 in the audience, where as the night before they'd sold out in, yes you guessed it, Glasgow! It was a tight squeeze for the six of them on stage.

The audience were well up to this one and they were greeted by a mighty cheer and roar as they took to the stage and opened up with The Lost Song parts one and two from new album Distant Satellites, listened to in silence by a totally engrossed crowd, literally erupting in to applause and cheers when the song ended. Next up was Untouchable parts one and two, a real fave of mine, and once more the audience we totally in to what was being presented to them, no one talking through the set, everyone concentrating on the gig, which was wonderful.

This was a real old school gig, no flashy visuals, basic lighting and I think it was all the better for it. The music stood on it's own and the vocal interplay between Lee Douglas (much given to doing 'thumbs up' to the crowd!) and Vincent Cavanagh was excellent. They played tracks from the past 10 years including a wonderful version of 'A Natural Disaster' from 2003.

Like all the best gigs it was over far too soon, I could quite happily have listed to them in to the small hours, in fact once we got home 'Universal' was quickly placed in the CD player and left playing as we drifted off to sleep.