Music reviews

I've been to a couple of gigs this week and had one review published on teletext - hooray. This was from a gig at the leadmill on monday, though I actually preferred the support act - sound grade, but I quite liked it, so to rescue the words from obscurity I shall paste them here:
I was a cub scout - live leadmill 29/10

I don't know what Todd Marriott's fire making or knot tying skills are like, but on tonight's performance he will be gaining his synth twiddling badge with distinction. Bedroom synth pop is given life and vibrancy from driving live percussion, this is no geeky art noise but a colossus of pulsing pop. Todd's distinct vocals work well with the clattering guitar and his passionate performance is infective. Pinks squares epitomises the best of their catchy sound. Akela would be pleased.

8/10

Forward Russia were the headline act, and although they produced a riotous noise, the lack of vocal variety began to bore me a bit.i was a cub scout. The penned review didn't make the planet I'm always a little embarrassed when a slightly critical review is published, I really respect anyone who forms and plays in a band - creativity should be encouraged and i hope my criticism can help encourage them to greater things. They probably will never see it anyway ;)

The second gig was the remarkable arcade fire who i saw at nottingham arena. The third time i've seen them live this year. Being seated i felt that somehow the passion on the stage was sucked out by the cavernous venue and so i didn't really get into the live experience as much as previous times. The music was still unbelievably good, musical prowess at it's height, they have a knack of arranging a myriad of musical sounds to form a cacophony of pulsing rock. I'm pleased that they are reaching super group status, but sorry that the energy of more intimate gigs can not be felt as strongly. There were a couple of new songs played and also a Smiths cover, but disappointingly some idiots thought it would be good to throw bottles at the band. Win Butler was understandably annoyed and promptly left the stage after finishing the song where the incident occurred. The band did reappear but another bottle was thrown enraging Butler further who exclaimed the band would never play Nottingham again if anything else came their way. Thankfully nothing did and the band did return for an encore, but I can't help thinking that the encore was somewhat reduced in length because of the incident. Bah - arena gigs are a let down (apart from the white stripes who were awesome a few years ago)