There'll be a full report on the recording session/gig thingy on Freq in the next few days- I'll link when it's up there (if I posted my review here the guy who got me on the guest list for it, lilly's husband, would never speak to me again!).
But for now, here's Hour One of TG+.
IRCD30- Oundle School
The legendary Oundle School gig, which I'd never heard before!
This one's slightly from memory, cos I just listened to it while walking the dog, so rather than a blow-by-blow account, here's an all-over review (the other 9 should be "as-it-happens" commentary, and therefore better).
It starts with a typically sardonic Gen intro... "hope you all had a nice time in chapel", that kind of thing... then we're swept gradually into a classic TG soundscape. THAT bass rumble, the howling white noise that sounds like whirlwinds across a glacier, the echoed cornet noise like mammoths calling to each other. In short, its beautiful. Then we're into some nice arpeggiated flange on some cool synth pulses, while Gen launches into a particularly inspired take on the "Old Man Smiled" section from Heathen Earth... with Captain Clarke, having flown back and forth from Spain for 23 years, matched with pilot Clarke crashing his plane over Florida, and the passengers screaming "WHY?!" Can the world be as sad as it seems, indeed...
He even manages to get a Heathen Earth call-and-response number going; something much more visceral, dirty, and, well, just plain NOISY than anything on the album of the same name. Glorious.
A particularly nasty version of Subhuman follows shortly after, with the feedback and white noise cranked up to eleven; and one can only wonder at the reaction of the teachers. (If only I'd been at that school... what a day, to coin a phrase!)
More arpeggiated madness, which after a while ends and is replaced by the frankly bizarre sound of the audience blasting out Jerusalem, until Gen returns with a few words about how Jerusalem could NEVER have been "builded" in "England's green and pleasant land", cos England's a toilet.
Now it gets truly awesome. A nice lazy roll of electronics, pulsing up and down like waves of sound on a beach, gradually gets totally fucked by increasingly manic drills of high-pitched mayhem while the whole thing gets swathed in sheets of white noise. Throughout, the lazy, almost relaxing pace keeps up, making the whole thing like a particularly odd dream.
Finally, we get some more mad fucking NOISE. Possibly a totally demented Discipline... possibly not; Gen's just so manic it's hard to tell, but that tribal beat's there.
Eventually, of course, boys will be boys, and these boys regale Cosey with a particularly suave chant of "show us yer legs"...
Schooldays, eh? Best days of your life for some...
(NB- if anyone knows, or has read an account by, anyone who was actually a pupil at Oundle and SAW this show, please tell me... I'd be fascinated to know what reaction was instilled.)
Oh, I'm guessing, by the way, the "exclusive" TG:NOW CD/vinyl should probably be available all over in the near future, what with them probably having had enough pressed for a whole festival which never happened. (AFAIK, the vinyl, while looking nicer, has "edited" versions of a couple of the tracks- this is according to the track listing, anyway). |
