'JOIN IN THE CHANT'

- Impulse 9, X Lover, Marlow, Beautiful Deadly Children, Synthetic, Upstairs @ The Garage 28/07/2003.

IMPULSE 9

It's Saturday night and if your going to Lydia Lunch's gig at the Garage, you're in for a big surprise if you go upstairs, as there's a small gathering of some rather wonderful Electrogoth bands just waiting to be discovered. As there's an element of cross-over between Lydia Lunch's following and the London tribe of Goth boys and girls, this gig isn't as full as you might expect for a Saturday. It does feel sometimes at these gigs that there never seems to be any new faces.

Add to this that tonight's audience seems to mainly consist on singers from other bands (Duncan from Needleye, Rob from Sulpher, Roi from Mechanical Cabaret, Lee from the Chaos Engine and Jules from the Sepia to name but five) and you're stuck with what can sometimes seem like a slightly incestuous scene. But at least we're mainly seeing 'new blood' onstage tonight (if you'll excuse the pun!).

First up are Impulse 9. I'd heard great things about this band and so was looking forward to their performance. Surprisingly, they are a duo with with a shaggy haired guitarist and a vocalist who also handles keyboard duties. As might be expected, the fact that the singer's got his hands full results in a pretty static performance. Sound-wise they're a 242 derived EBM act in the best tradition of The Chaos Engine (seeing as he's here tonight, I wonder what Lee thought?). We also get a techno-upped version of 'Lucretia My Reflection' in their set (sadly missing the thumping hypnotic beat of the original) and the boys are cursed with that common complaint of 21st Century electro bands - DMDS (Dodgy Mini Disc Syndrome), luckily a quick blow (oo-er!) on the player seems to correct the fault. Like the Sepia, their sounds would be fantastic on a dancefloor, but also as with the Sepia, you really wish that they'd try and make the actual live performance more visually stimulating.

Second band X-Lover (perhaps either fans of the X Men or a band formerly known as Lover) are, in the words of Monty Python, 'something completely different'. As we have (wait for it) real drums and a bass player coupled with a lady singer. Surprisingly, all the lead musical parts appear to be on tape elsewhere but it's so nice to see a rhythm section onstage rather than the usual array of black boxes. It terms of their sound, early Garbage and Curve would be the laziest

X LOVER

comparisons but this band take their electro cross over into a far darker and sleazier place. Lots of hardcore pornographic imagery and even if it is a sweaty night, our lacey voiced, Chrissy Hynde-tinged lead singer does appear to be pleased to see us judging by the contents of her rather tight t-shirt. A refreshing change from all the usual 242 clones that we always seem to see at these gigs, X-Lover are definitely a band worth exploring further, especially as the rumour mill would have it that Cubanate's Marc Heal will be having a hand in their future.

Next are Marlow. Basildon resident Rob Marlow may not be familiar to many, but if it wasn't for him being in a band with a young Andrew Fletcher and Vince Clarke, the chances are that we would never have had a certain band who you may have heard of by the name of Depeche Mode. Marlow's performance style is very early Soft Cell, in that we have one keyboard player flanked by two dancers/backing vocalists and Mr Marlow himself at the front in a rather fetching Hawaiian shirt.  The sound of his early collaborators appears to have rubbed off, as there's a light-weight very early eighties moog-bassline heavy feel to Marlow's music, which in comparison to all the doomy dancefloor stuff that everybody else is flirting with is actually quite refreshing. Marlow's passionate vocal style is a reminder that retro-futurism need not be all cold robotic as certain 'NME darlings' might make you think. Yes Ladytron, I'm talking to you!

It's a shame that the Beautiful Deadly Children have to set up their own equipment, as we get to see their rather extravagant costumes before they've even started performing, and it does somewhat spoil the surprise. Their number includes a singer with the high camp of Tom Baker sprouting the best script that Douglas Adams never wrote, a Skeleton masked cenobite handling the sound mix, an androgynous Goth lady behind a coffin shaped keyboard, and a winged Morticia Adams lookalike whose sole function seems to be to wave her chest and and rather pert behind at the audience.  Once they've mounted the stage there's hardly any room for them to move (and I think there's normally a guitarist as well!), and we're really left hoping that this is going to sound as good as it looks. Admittedly the whole Goth schlock cabaret thing does appear to be making a comeback with the likes of Ein Steifen, Scary Bitches and some other guy named after a 50s movie star and the leader of a bunch of killer hippies. However, The BDC seem to be taking this to the max, which is particularly admirable considering they're probably on a far tighter budget than Mr Manson.

The cabaret element does take away from the fact that probably very little of their show is actually 'live' but The BDC do have a rather super repertoire of songs, including a cover of Ministry's 'Everyday is Halloween' (Yes, contrary to current publicity, Al Jourgensen did indeed have a career prior to 1988!) and a wonderful ode to to the Daleks which reverberates with shrieks of 'Exterminate' and sees the members of the band darting about the stage with sink plungers held out front. It's a laugh, and a pleasure to see somebody putting this much effort into the presentation of their live performance.

SYNTHETIC

And finally to Synthetic.  I was a bit worried that The Beautiful Deadly Children might steal some of their thunder, until I saw Synthetic's new female lead singer and realised that it was in fact mainman Tim in drag! And very lovely he looks too, with his big bunches and wedding dress! Sarn's wearing a pink tu-tu, although Paul the perma-shaded guitarist is still turning up in his best Martin Rev leatherwear.

Set-wise, Synthetic seem to trying to give a complete overview of their repertoire with a decent mixture of older songs and material from the recent 'Control' album, and this marriage of the new and the old works pretty well. They're strongest selling point is still their 'in-yer-face' performance style, with Tim's energy levels so high they could surely power half a city. Paul the guitarist still seems to maintain a pretty low profile onstage compared to Tim and Sarn, but his musicianship is hard to fault, and he gives Synthetic (who are supposedly electro band) more rock dynamics than a thousand Anthrax wannabes.

Not a bad night, but if there's any disappointment it has to be with the turn out. I know that this is a point that I've made a million times, but if compared to how packed the London Goth clubs are, it amazes me just how few people can actually be bothered to turn up to live gigs. We've got some great bands in London, they're deserving of a far busier scene than the one we have at present. Y'hear that all you Goth boys and girls at home watching The National Lottery live?

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