Blog: Art Brut!

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OMG! And when i say OMG, i mean OMFG! For LO! i went to see Art Brut last night, and they were RIDICULOUSLY BRILLIANT!! Just AMAZINGLY GRATE! It was BRILL!

I went due to the good offices of Mr (Carsmile) S Hewitt, who had a spare ticket and kindly bestowed it on me. We met in the Actually All Right (though it looks really horrible from the outside) pub near the Astoria, and were briefly joined for cheery banter and LARKS by The Venue Of My Gig. Soon however it was time for ROCK, so she went home and the rest of us went next door. We saw a TINY bit of Untitled Music Project (NB the last minute) and then it was The Chalets, who were dead good - it felt a bit weird to see them on a proper big stage, being a Proper Band-Style Band, as it's not THAT long ago since i played with them in a (admittedly quite big) PUB in Cork.

I've not been in the LA2 (or the Town & Country Club, or The Mean Fiddler, or whatever it's called now) and felt a bit ODD about being in what APPEARED to be a normal venue that was, actually, DEEP UNDERGROUND. It was ODD. Anyway, soon it was time for ACTION and the Art Brut came on and, as i may have mentioned, were BRILLIANT. I'd not seen them before and was expected a sort of jolly indie ramshackle bit of fun, i WASN'T expecting them to be so MIGHTY and ROCK. They started off with "Formed A Band" and the whole place went MENTAL, and stayed that way for the next hour or so. There was shouting, there was a LOT of singing along, there was jumping up and down, and Mr E Argos was a FANTASTIC front man - again, I had expected ramshackleNESS, not SHOWMANSHIP and MAGNIFICENCE. I especially liked the Skipping With The Microphone Lead BIT, it was ACE.

The really good thing about them though is they're ROCK and LOUD and CATCHY but, unlike almost ALL OTHER BANDS like that, seem a) like proper nice people and b) have GRATE lyrics that are about GRATE things. Evidence of a) was especially clear in the way that the bass player spent the whole night GRINNING like mad and singing along with ALL the songs, despite not having a microphone. We saw b) in the way Mr Argos LECTURED the crowd about the fact they all COULD and SHOULD form their own bands, and it made you realise how POSITIVE, EXCITING, and GRATE all their words are.

I spent the whole time GRINNING like mad, and even the IMMENSELY ARSEY bouncers and APPALLINGLY badly organised Audience Exit Strategy of the venue (if there's ever a fire there EVERYONE will be DOOMED) couldn't dampen my GLEEFULNESS. It really was the BEST gig i have been to in AGES, and also one of the BEST! GIGS! EVER! - it was ESPECIALLY one of the best for one of those size of venues too, usually in places like that i feel uncomfortable, wedged in, and ALIENATED, but last night it felt like one big HAPPY CROWD. Did i mention how much i liked it?

I was also quite pleased with the fact that i was leaving for home at a reasonable hour, and also that i had managed to stay awake, as i was still feeling a bit done in from the old International Travel. This situation, however, was not to last - somewhere around Holborn i nodded off and was awoken some time later by a cheery Essex GEEZER saying "Oi Mate! Wake up, it's EPPING!"

Oh bloody heck. What a PILLOCK i felt, as I got out and very sheepishly went to ask the guy on the platform whether there might be another train going home the other way. I think i may not have been the FIRST person ever to do this, as he was very nice about the whole thing - according to the timetables on the walls i'd just MISSED the last one, but he very kindly told me there was a SECRET Last Train To Leytonstone in about half an hour, so i hung around feeling like a CHUMP and then gratefully boarded the Secret Train and was soon discovering that Epping is a REALLY LONG WAY AWAY. It took AGES to get home!

When i DID get home tho it was to find the aforementioned Songs On My Setlist still up and, soon, AMUSED by my idiocy, and thus it was with RELIEF and a heart full of ROCK JOY that i was able, at last, to retire. It had been an evening of GRATE! NESS!

posted 16/11/2006 by MJ Hibbett

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