Seeks Music

Plans are all very well, but real life doesn’t seem to have much regard for them. By day three, wheels start to come off The Great Escape wagon. (If you’re doing it right anyway.) We’d had an aimless morning not quite managing to catch any one properly, before settling in The Mesmerist for IYES.
They weren’t having the best day either. Technical difficulties meant that their backing tracks weren’t operational. Fortunately, they rose to the challenge and played a stripped down set, comprising of two electric guitars and vocals. This drew them closer in tone to The XX than they are in reality, but the minimal arrangements and crystalline vocals were a welcome soundscape to the morning after the nights before. A delicate cover of Bon Iver’s Flume closed the curtailed, yet tantalising set.

Technical problems bugged Lu Lu James as well. Not that we noticed. We were too busy falling in love. Lu Lu arrived on stage, hooded, swathed in black robes. Occasionally peeping out, coyly eyeing her audience. That’s the last time you’ll read the word “coy” in a Lu Lu James review however, I mean, just look at that picture below. She had a great rapport with the crowd who warmed to her immediately, and dealt with whatever technical problems they were having in the time manner of threatening the sound man with physical violence.
Lu Lu James isn’t a star in waiting, she isn’t waiting.

By the time Lu Lu James left the stage, the queue for Chvrches was disappearing off down towards Brighton Marina, while inside we were pinned against the back wall of the club by the unrelenting bass frequencies of Mø. They were probably pretty good, it’s hard to tell. We were in the eye of a subsonic storm. You win Mø. I’m not sure what you win, but you win.

You don’t expect to be confronted by your own mortality at a Chvches gig, but the men in the audience were given pause for thought by front woman Lauren Mayberry when she introduced a song with the words “This song is about girls who are cunts to other girls. You shouldn’t do that because men die first, you know so….” I don’t know how the sentence finished, I don’t think I know anything any more. Where is my wife and family, what if I die here…

Still it’s hard to be morbid for long at a Chvches gig when there is so much life affirming joy pouring from the speakers. Not lyrically maybe, Lauren was probably still singing about girls who are cuntish, but the infectious, anthemic melodies gladden your heart, and her vocal sound is the perfect accompaniment.

Woods closed this years Great Escape for us. Yes, alright, we’d later go on to fail miserably to see Parquet Courts, and end up in that place with the sticky floor watching Soul Sister Dance Revolution, but whiskey made us do that. Woods was a conscious decision.
Well done conscious brain. Wood were amazing, they rocked out way more than I expected, epic jams weren’t at all self-indulgent (ahem U.M.O.) and falsetto vocals soared. The only fly in the ointment was the bass player’s dysfunctional guitar strap. The day three gremlin’s last huzzah.

Day two started with a whimper, but after a self-medicating trip to Bill’s all was, better, if not exactly awesome. If there’s a more amazing fry up in Brighton, I’d like to hear about it.

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