- Independent UK Promoting

COG Review - 5/12/09 (Kissaway Trail/4 or 5 Magicians/Work)

Club Night Review

Saturday 5^th December at the Lexington

Bands: Kissaway Trail, 4 or 5 Magicians, Work

Dangling upside down over the edge of this high-rise rooftop, I realise that I never wanted much from life. Not for me are the fancy cars, fancier mansions and £1000-a-night women. No, I’d be happy with great live music and a tug off a shell-suit wearing tranny on methadone. On a bus.

Happily, while Club COG do not provide post-op streetwalkers (or buses), they do provide great live music in a central London location. Convenient for me, but alas, also convenient for my indie-loving debtors. This particular night began as all great nights should end – with Work. The bemusement at the fact this band are not yet headlining venues like Islington or Brixton soon pass, as the music claws in your skull, grabs the attention of every cell you have and starts taking you away; be it to a room of rich, textured melancholy, or a cloud of enchanting rhapsody, it’s always to a better place.

For the uninitiated, the COG regulars are a piano led, uniformly talented indie foursome with power, consistent quality, and a strange ability to make every note they play sound like it matters. To hear Work play is a purifying experience from the turgid offerings of well-marketed bands like Keane. Work are the chlorine to Snow Patrol’s pool of piss. The commanding build-ups in songs like ‘Puzzle Pieces’, ‘Aim to Please’ and ‘Brave’ are beautifully judged and executed with passion and precision.

In this particular set they played several new songs. Some average bands can get lucky with one or two great tunes, but real talent and ability manifests in the consistency of a band’s repertoire. The fact that new songs like ‘Make Your Move’ showcased the same sterling songcraft and tight, purposeful musicianship as their more established tracks is a testament to their calibre.

Work were inspired on the night, to a packed crowd who either loved them, or grew to love them over a quite arresting set. It would take a hell of an act to make an impression after them. 4 or 5 Magicians didn’t. Apparently 4 Magicians (I counted) are ‘witty’. Their lyrics are ‘acerbic’. They get compared to Alex Turner and Mike Skinner (and we all know what amazing commentators on the social condition they are) on such august annals of knowledge and insight as NME and Rocksound.

The fact is, while they are massively over-hyped and play an overexposed garage-rock/punk sound, they’re not bad. Their riffs are catchy but simple, and their lyrics are reasonably witty without being insightful, but they offer enough to keep you interested. The problem with 4 Magicians is that they don’t have their own sound. They sound like Green Day, Pavement, a pinch of early Idlewild, a splash of Bush, and a little of a million other generic bands.

If you heard the songs recorded, and recognised them when they were played, then they would be half-way enjoyable. But when heard for the first time in a live setting, not a single song stood out. They sounded flavourless, so much so it became a chore to listen to them. Perhaps being sandwiched between more melodic bands didn’t help, but even so they offer nothing new at all, live or recorded. Sometimes having a list of influences on your MySpace page backfires for a band. Time spent listening to 4 Magicians could’ve been better spent listening to their list (except Weezer, who’s latest stuff is as shit as the winter nights are long).

The headliners followed, and arrived on stage to enthusiastic cheering. The Danish band Kissaway Trail have already made an impression on the Indie intelligentsia in London, owing to their Arcade Fire/Sigur Ros style contemplative melodies and harmonic vocals. Tonight they fully justified the measured hype surrounding them.

One of the main qualities that attract people to Kissaway Trail appears to be the fact that they’re one of the few people who’ve seen the two aforementioned bands and attempted to emulate them. Indeed, this multi-instrumental, layered sound (coupled with Arthouse-style drivel for lyrics) seems a style of music only foreign English speakers are able to produce (Arcade Fire are from Quebec). Perhaps therein lies the appeal, as this style is pretentious by its nature, but somehow someone with a continental accent can give it enough sophistication to not make it overtly so. That, or you have to be a bunch of mental gown-wearing hippies like the Polyphonic Spree.

While their tracks didn’t always hit the spot (current single ‘SDP’ is actually their most pretentious and weakest effort), they’re capable of being joyous, uplifting and memorable. ‘61’ in particular, both live and on their MySpace, is absolutely stunning. They crowned off an excellent night, to end what has been a vintage year for Club COG. The hired muscle’s arms are getting tired. His wrists are losing strength, and he’s losing grip. I’d tell them where the money is, but there’s a good chance I can land on that paddling pool. The kids are all from the learning difficulties school, so I doubt their parents would miss them really. Fuck it, I’m taking my chances. Have a penny-pinching Christmas and see you in the new year.

Muhammad Odeh