The Duke Special @ The Glee Club – 2nd June 2008

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King Kong was vanquished, Godzilla was long gone, there was nothing else to do, so I ventured down to the Glee Club. If you were to compare the night’s gig to sports, it would be more akin to a darts championship than the Running of the Bulls — and yes you can have a meal with your gig; a practice even classical venues refrain from. But for all that, it was a pretty decent gig.

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The support for the night was provided by the Voluntary Butler Scheme; a local lad who otherwise goes by the name of Bob. VBS is a pretty fun act to watch, and was recently chosen to support Joe Lean and the Jing Jang Jong at the Academy, and although he was playing to a younger audience than tonight, he still had a lot of respect. Doing most of his work with a loop pedal, he has a wide repertoire of noises to call upon. This was augmented by his excellent vocals; an excellent range which is only spoilt by his insistence on traditional, African-style vocals, which never look good on a white man. Nonetheless he has a good command of lyricism — e.g. ‘if you were broccoli/I’d turn vegetarian for you’ — and his innocent adolescent humour helped warm the audience. Tracks like ‘The Eiffel Tower and the BT Tower’ are very sweet, but someone needs to tell the man that he’s never going to steal hearts with a ukulele and a kazoo. Nonetheless a consummate performer we need to see more of.

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The Duke Special were altogether a different animal. Once again another one man band — with occasional percussion aid from the VBS — but this time, gone was the immaturity. In its place came the dreadlocks, make-up and the Irish/American accent. This kind of getup is a common occurrence at venues like the Academy, but down here, to a seated audience it was weird. But fun nonetheless. Coming onstage to deliberately aged cinema reels, with t-lights on your piano and singing songs with titles like ‘those proverbs we made in the winter must end’ was never going to get you respect in the real world, but to this audience of fans — some of whom have been with the band for a good while — it was just what was called for. And this was a musician who knew how to play his audience, stopping to hand around song-sheets at one point as if he was orchestrating a carol choir. And whilst the male/female choir off did seem like sick puppetry, the audience were loving it.

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Sole band member Peter Wilson pulled off a series of ragtime-bluesy pieces which, if it didn’t actually get the audience out of their tightly packed chairs, at least got them singing along. It was the kind of music you would find playing in the world of the dead in any Tim Burton film and you have to wonder what the guys who define genres for iTunes would make of it. All in all it was a pretty musically outstanding gig. If you get the opportunity though, give both bands a try.

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Review – Ross Fisher
Photos – Tom Horton

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