BooHooHoo launched their first official release on Wednesday.
BM first caught them back in the heady days of summer at the Ette album launch and they made a pretty instant impression (see ITM review).
Since then they played several more gigs (BM also reviewed them on these pages supporting Teen Canteen at their album launch at Mono, the evenings still light at that point). Now as the darkest days of winter are upon us they unleash a brace of electrostompers or bouncers (yeh, electrobouncers, you can have than one for free guys) on a capacity audience. Promoters and general scene eggers-on Last Night from Glasgow have done a great job in getting the gig publicity and it is sold out. The TShirts (sold as a package with tickets) and the natty designer wristband USB versions of the EP are doing swift business and will also spread the news. There is an air of anticipation and BM also knows that this was the preferred venue for a headline date, good for showcasing their lighting effects and a generally good vibe venue anyway.
Support act Stephen Solo also played the Teen Canteen launch at Mono and tonight he seems more confident and the sound, more guitar than mobile phone recordings, appears to be more muscular. He gets a good hearing and reaction from the crowd and BM thinks he can take heart from this and go further and bigger in 2017, being up there yourself is not always easy!
After a fog of dry ice BHH got into things sometime after 9pm. Four musicians, with one male and one female lead vocalist, often doubling up. The set includes the three EP Tracks – ‘Mould Me’ (aka the one with the flute solo from Liz, and a completely OTT involving ludicrous backdrops etc, such fun), ‘Dreams Tonight’ (Liz on vocals) and ‘Now is the Season’ (with a very 80s nan nan a hey chant reminding BM of something, oh dear, Kajagoogoo maybe, ha!) as well as number of BHH bangers.
And there is the cover version, a storming ‘Easy Lover’, an 80s no 1 featuring the two Phils, Collins and Bailey. The audience was sporadically moving, iie small pockets of dancing, BM thinks on a weekend night they might have got total lift-off but on a school night with quite a few insiders and heaven forfend critics it may never have had the potential to reach critical mass for a complete audience wig-out, god knows we tried though and a number of those static people admitted later that they found themselves inadvertently twitching, always a good sign…
How to describe the music – bouncy, ridiculously catchy, sophisticated, funky, ectstatic… just go listen, BOOHOOHOO ARE NOW ON ITUNES so you can pay for it too! ‘Debuthoohoo’, so it is, the three tracks, are now available for download.
The only mood-killer was a relative of the band who was not too happy with BM’s dancing getting in his way – maybe there should be a separate “grumpy area” at gigs where such people can be unimpeded by audience members actually enjoying themselves – never mind….!
This was one of the most positive experiences of the year and confirms BHH as one of 2016’s discoveries (BM understands that TNFG took a bit of a punt on them, maybe not dead convinced from the start, but they are now!) and just so well done to everyone, award yourselves a gold star. There was no encore (“we don’t know any more tunes!” – but to be honest they could have played the entire set again, would have been great!)
In ecstacy…