Glasgow city centre was incredibly busy along Argyll St at the somewhat early hour of 6pm as BM traipsed along to Mono, which was itself a quieter part of town. A wee visit to Monorail was in order (but only £12.99 spent this time, relatively cheap!).
And the prospect of seeing 5 Lost Map-approved acts for £12 was seeming like quite a bargain, and it certainly turned out to be!
BM would just like to congratulate Lost Map for ploughing their own distinctive and eccentric furrow in the face of…well everything really this year, pandemic, re-arranged and cancelled gigs, increasing use of streaming and of course that vinyl shortage – Johnny Lynch and the rest have continued to show The Man the finger and just get on with some seriously great and diverse musical projects…
Anyway, first one (and with the bar filling up) was Glasgow’s Sulka aka Lucas Clasen, playing acoustic tonight with only his keyboard player/back vocals to accompany him. Some of the music was drowned out by the increasingly noisy bar queue but these were beautiful, intelligent and subtle tracks, lifted mainly from his debut album ‘Take Care‘ and recent ‘Front Door’ EP, released on Lost Map.
Next up was Happy Spendy, somewhat reduced in personnel since the last gig BM saw in summer 2019, in fact down to one! Main woman, Stroke City-born Eimear Coyle deployed keyboards and beat machines to sing her way through some riff-heavy and danceable numbers, with quite a lot more soul/funk influences that BM seemed to remember from before. Some new material BM thinks, and some from the Lost Map album ‘You’re Doing Okay’, released under lockdown. Sporting a Santa hat and clearly enjoying herself despite fluffing a keyboard riff, Eimear did herself proud and clearly relished the experience of performing live – the audience by this time had grown and there was a sizeable queue for the bar…
It was at this point that Jenny Moore’s Mystic Business unleashed themselves on the audience. This London-based combo certainly do things their own way, starting with band members banging some tubes from around the room before convening onstage for the first number. There are six (BM thinks, okay listed as Jenny Moore, Louise O’Connor, Rubie Green, Nandi Bhebhe, Jeni Be and Rachel Horwood) people onstage tonight and they mainly sing, in close harmony, although keyboards, percussion and bass are also deployed at times.
The audience reaction went from WTF to ecstatic applause – was this only their second Scottish appearance after last night’s Edinburgh Humbug, BM is not sure… Jenny Moore herself came across like a somewhat less confrontational Amanda Palmer maybe channelling Anna Meredith and The Incredible String Band, with stage presence and charisma in equal measure. Impressive! – tracks were mainly from Lost Map release ‘He Earns Enough”‘ with Empress Of cover ‘Woman Is A Word’ being probably the highlight of the set.
Perhaps the most conventionally “rock” band on the bill were next, Glasgow-based Savage Mansion. Another outfit who have had to contend with Covid, the band (comprising Craig Angus (vocals, guitar), Andrew Macpherson (guitar), Beth Chalmers (keys), Jamie Dubber (bass) and Lewis Orr (drums) have been busy, releasing ‘Live at the Hug and Pint’ last year and have a new album due to be released early next year, entitled ‘Golden Mountain, Here I Come’.
Tonight we got tracks from both, along with some fairly OTT guitar wigouts, plus resounding keys and backline. Singer Craig Angus was a convincing frontman, and like everyone tonight the band was clearly relishing tearing up a stage in front of an audience (oh and by this time the bar queue was stretching across half the venue, there was some serious lost revenue here and management should have simply called for volunteers to man the taps, most people here have pulled a pint at least once in their lives…).
The most interesting appearance was left until last, Herbert Powell, a Glasgow-based act who apparently were on the up around 5-6 years ago, then fell apart for various reasons. The personnel – Kieran Thomas (vocals, bass), ‘Romeo’ Taylor Stewart (drums), Kay Logan (guitar) and Billy Gaughan (guitar),did however decide to complete their debut album ‘Here In My Scheme, Here It Ends’, during Covid, so this was their first live gig in years… (they added a bassist who flow over from Spain at short notice, pure rock n roll!)
The band play angular guitar music, with two guitars constantly crossing lines, a bit like Television or maybe even Gang of Four (and King Crimson’s ‘Discipline’ album..). There are almost numerous time changes, jittery stop/starts and a variety of vocal styles. The music is catchy but weird, with some prog elements and also some real sonic shakedowns…well worth a listen and this live appearance caused somewhat of a moshpit at the front of the stage…
The night did not end there (Freelove were DJing) at this point BM did the sensible thing and pushed off for the last bus…
Again all BM can say is thanks to Johnny and his many cohorts for such a great, inclusive and friendly night – and long may Lost Map’s lum reek!