Fangbase - Reviews

Bierkeller, Bristol

Sunday 7th July 2002

I'd not seen The Damned since Rock City, Nottingham in 1985, on the Phantasmagoria tour, so I was really looking forward to this one, especially after getting hold of Grave Disorder, and digging out all my old stuff.....

We were 'treated' to two support acts, the first of which (I think were local) and were called Hacksaw. Before they came on, I had nipped off to the loo, and the guy stood next to me introduced himself saying "I'm in the support band, we're shit"! How wrong he was! There were just the two of them, him on drums and vocals, and another guy on guitar, but they made an excellent noise between them - loads of 60 second, 100mph shouty- punk stuff. What made them even better was that they didn't take themselves seriously....they were out to have a laugh, even going to the lengths of distributing toilet rolls around the audience, in order for us to throw them at the stage during the song "Bog Roll" (only decipherable lyric..."Bog Roll" repeated over and over again extremely fast!). Excellent stuff, including "The Official Punk Rock Anthem Of The World Cup 2002 In Japan And Korea", and highly recommended to anyone who gets the chance to see them.

Unfortunately, the second support act (whose name escapes me but sounded German) did not share Hacksaw's sense of fun, taking themselves rather too seriously. They weren't bad, and the lead singer (who also played guitar, and better than the other guitarist) had plenty of Lydonesque attitude, but I couldn't help but laugh at their attempts to be serious punks. The other guitarist was especially off-putting, attempting to do all the rock posturing, sneering and staring, but only succeeding in making himself look like a dickhead......My advice, guys....lose the guitarist and try it as a three-piece....you're good enough, and maybe we won't laugh at you....

Anyway, on to the reason we were there.....and what can I say? Excellent sound, excellent set-list, plenty of banter with the audience.....and me, crushed against the barriers right at the front, dead centre, 36 going on 16! They opened with an excellent 'Street Of Dreams', then spent the next hour and three quarters or so dishing out an assortment of old and new. Along the way we had 'Plan 9 Channel 7', 'I Just Can't Be Happy Today', 'Love Song', 'New Rose', 'Neat Neat Neat', 'Eloise', 'Smash It Up', a couple of others whose names escape me at the moment, and an absolutely storming 'Wait For The Blackout'. I'm guessing that we got about half a dozen from the new album, but you'll have to forgive me on titles, as although I have Grave Disorder, I have not yet commited song titles to memory (though I know that one of the tracks was 'Democracy'). We were even 'treated' to the Captain's solo rendition of 'Happy Talk' (apparently we asked for it, though I never actually heard anyone asking!).

I've come away with a cracking bruise across my ribs where I was crushed at the front, but hey, that's what it's all about, right?

Here's looking forward to the next time....I just hope I don't leave it ANOTHER 17 years....

Matt Harkness