Support act The Sound Ex are a raucous four piece from the North of England who burst onto the stage in a frenzy of shouty vocals and squealing guitars. A mixture of chunky riffs and jangly indie guitar makes it hard to pinpoint a genre they would fit into, although I feel they’d go down well with fans of the Wildhearts.
Therapy? make a welcome return to Glasgow after nearly two years, opening their set with current single ‘I Told You I Was Ill’, from their newest album, Crooked Timber. A technical hitch on the vocals makes them sound muddy, then disappear, but that’s quickly sorted. Next up is another new track, ‘Clowns Galore’ which has a fairly sinister sound with a really heavy bass-line. All the new tracks seem to be heavier than the previous output, it seems more urgent and intense. A lone crowd surfer attempts to get over the barrier but is chucked unceremoniously back into the melee by security. Singer Andy Cairns provides excellent banter, joking around between songs.
‘If It Kills Me’ from the album High Anxiety is followed by new track ‘Somnambulist’. There is a bunch of hardcore fans down the front singing along word for word with the new stuff which please the band no end. Andy introduces ‘Turn’ with “this song’s from the last century!” When he starts to ‘sing’ the intro to ‘Teethgrinder’ the place erupts and the crowd join in and start a proper mosh-pit. To follow this is some feat but they manage it by playing ‘Teethgrinder’s lesser known b-side, ‘Summer of Hate’ which most of the crowd seem to know and love. He teases the crowd again by singing, “James Joyce is… James Joyce is… required reading on the curriculum of every school” then launches right into the brilliantly named ‘Potato Junkie’, with the audience singing so loudly he gives up and lets them sing the last section. ‘The Head That Tried To Strangle Itself’ is followed by ‘Crooked Timber’, which is taken from this quote from noted philosopher, Immanuel Kant: “Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made.” Seems quite apt for the rough and ready, raw sound that Therapy? have been producing for the past twenty years. This is less heavy, yet far more sinister than the rest of the album. With a shout of “Cheers Glasgow, you’ve made an old fat man very happy!” the band are off for a few moments.
A few technical hitches hold up the encore for a bit longer than expected, but the crowd don’t seem to mind too much. Andy shimmys around a bit on stage and jokes that he’ll have to continue the set through the medium of alternative dance if the guitars don’t behave themselves! After things are sorted out we are treated to a brand new, as yet unnamed track, a long intricate instrumental with wide use of effect pedals and a bass solo! It does go on for quite a while and some of the crowd seem a bit perplexed, but mostly enjoy it and it gets a decent round of applause. Therapy? get the crowd going again with ‘Stories’ from 1995 album ‘Infernal Love, then Andy sings the first few lines of the Beatles ‘Nowhere Man’ as an intro to ‘Nowhere’ before finishing the evening with a pumped up, rockier than usual version of ‘Screamager’ which leaves the entire crowd on a high.