The Cheshire plain is dotted with small but frequently fabulous music venues, tonights gig location is no exception. A small pub in Northwich but known for putting on a lot of gigs and a great atmosphere.
Opening the night are Decibel. Their post punk stylings are firmly placed in the early 1980s. There’s a lot of space in their sound with guitar adding in short motifs that eventually build alongside the vocals to a more full and frenzied yet still controlled sound. The bass and drums are often carrying their songs forward to be joined by almost Killing Joke six string parts giving sudden angular boosts to their sound.
The unlikely named Spam Javelin are well known on the punk circuit, lead by Neil Crud who seems to have fingers in many punk pies including his eponymous Louder Than War radio show. The band haven’t played live in around two years and tonights appearance is (we are told) a very last minute fill in for another band. They appear rusty at the start but some amp changes and warming up later their set is sharp, fast, full of humour and politics and some very good songs. ‘I Don’t Believe You’ and ‘Nazi line Dancers’ in particular stick in the mind after the show.
The Dry Retch play a sonic assault of Stooges style musical violence. It’s pounding, loud, very fast and has a distinct groove of the type that the MC5 would be proud of. They style themselves as being on permanent tour from Australia (due to the vocalists prominent Australian accent), the tour has lasted at least 25 years so far with much of it based in Wirral. The Dry Retch are an uncompromising blur of noise and movement.
WORDS BY RICHIE YATES
PHOTO CREDIT – JOHNNY REAY
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