Your Demise + The Eyes Of A Traitor + This Is Colour + Brutality Will Prevail @ Eddies Rock Club, Birmingham – 11th December 2009
Since the demise of Edwards No 8 on John Bright Street Eddies Rock Club has flirted with a residency at the Newt pub before settling into this, its current location, on Gough Street. It’s a strange location; off the beaten track geographically and musically, it represents the real alternative to the O2 Academy’s slew of fashionable indie gigs. The place screams working man’s club (I have a sneaking suspicion this was what it was previously) from the chintzy carpets to the snooker tables and Brew XI on the taps, but it feels like a great spiritual home for rock and metal gigs in the Midlands.
This Is Colour from Bury St Edmunds are a great little interesting hardcore/metal/prog band. They wear their varied musical influences on their T Shirts, ranging from Pantera to The Police. The crowd raise a few eyebrows at the mellow melodic rock interludes. But I think the light and shade really helps punctuate the heavy parts and marks them out from the legions of other bands with a straightahead metalcore sound. By the end of the set you can feel the audience warming to the band and their honest and gritty mix of styles.
The Eyes Of A Traitor up the energy levels a notch and get the crowd moshing a little bit. Hertfordshire metal doesn’t sound like the most ferocious tagline, but vocalist Jack Delany really gets in the punters’ faces and forces a reaction. He has a lot of conviction and poise which helps the material hit home. Musically, they are a little more generic than the previous band but still an enjoyable bunch.
St Albans based hardcore punkers Your Demise head the bill. This is the first night of their ‘Santa Slaughter’ tour and the Eddies Dungeon is now teeming with hardcore fans and some attractive members of both sexes. It’s always good to see some nice looking girls to balance things out in what can be a sometimes male dominated genre. I have noticed a sizeable contingent of fans from South Wales and even overheard what I think is some Italian being spoken.
After a mood building and majestic crescendo of classical music the band hit the stage. And it is savagely energetic. I am glad I moved to the side by the bar because the crowd gets quite lary. This is the point where beefy men whip out their backpacks from nowhere and start windmilling their arms and punching the air. Which always seems to me to alienate other parts of the crowd and cause a lot of people to stare at them rather than look at the band. Still, that’s the deal with hardcore gigs and I suppose part of the fun for lots of people.
The diminutive Your Demise vocalist leaps and pogos in and amongst the masses and whips them into a frenzy with shouts of ‘jump the fuck up!’, ‘open this place the fuck up!’ and ‘move the fuck forward!’. Parts of the ceiling tiles start to break up and collapse onto the crowd. (Your Demise will later sign parts of the ceiling for fans to take away which I think is brilliant). Musically Your Demise are more of a straight ahead assault on the senses, with pretty much every word being screamed along to by the crowd. I was a bit disappointed that they didn’t try to recreate a couple of the breakbeat tracks that they include on their album. Having said that they kick off big style live so I would definitely recommend going to see one of their gigs if you’re a fan of heavy music.
Review – Adam Moffatt
Photos – Steve Gerrard