Crud World Domination Enterprises give you
The
Telescopes & The Flowers of Hell
Club
AC30 – The Marquee 07/10/05
Yesterday saw the final night of the drone rock/experimental sounds
roadshow, which arrived in town amid stories of detained support acts,
near-fatal motorway madness and extraordinary scenes of Diva–like
behaviour. We arrive at the Marquee to
find that we are to be deprived of tonight’s E.A.R. performance because Sonic
Boom, the Mariah Carey of drone rock, has decided not to turn up to tonight’s gig,
due to the alarming revelation that the good people of the Marquee have point
blank refused to paint his dressing room in the required shade of pink, but
hey… there’s enough in the way of good sounds to more than make up for this and
besides…. no amount of mean-spiritedness on his part can disguise the fact that
while it would have been good to see him, we’re really here for the Telescopes
anyway… as are the all-star audience with the likes of Steve Lamacq and …er….
Steve Lamacq in attendance, who has knowingly turned up to show his appreciation
for one of the UK’s most influential acts.
First on are The Flowers of Hell
who put on a truly excellent show. Their
music (especially their organ sound) is strongly reminiscent of the backdrop
employed on Spiritualized’s Pure Phase album and is led by a mournful trumpet
which when combined is also strangely uplifting. Another piece sounds uncannily
like an amalgamation of Heroin and Black Angel Death Song by The Velvet
Underground. Still, it’s a great start and
although I’d have seriously loved to see the legendary Sonic Boom play, a
pleasure that has evaded me my entire gig going life, the fact is we’re on for
a good night anyway.
I’ve been told my last Antenna
review (Numero <<O>>) read like a thesis on the psychological
effects that experimental noise has on the mindset of unsuspecting victims (…
or something along those lines anyway), so tonight I’ll spare any such
pretensions. Suffice to say that the
show is mind-throbbingly good, starting off slow and building up to a
heart-beating crescendo of white noise and theramin-induced feedback. Is this right? I’m sure I heard an excerpt of Cabin In The
Sky in there somewhere although it could have easily all been improvisational
pieces. But that’s the beauty of The
Telescopes – making you’ve think you’ve heard sounds, you may or may not have
actually heard. I’m sure if you played
back the recording of tonight’s show you’d hear sounds you’d never heard on the
night.
The night ends with this reviewer
leaving the venue later than planned, getting horribly lost in London, ending
up in ‘leafy’ Harlesden, walking (…nay, running) past the burning cars,
drunkenly trying to negotiate his way back to Harrow, having to step over
people lying on the floor more trolleyed than himself etc etc. Still, he arrives home (eventually), safe in
the knowledge that he’s had yet another night to remember courtesy of the nice
people from The Telescopes and Club AC30.
So, a big up to all involved in tonight’s show and to The Telescopes
themselves, for pulling this tour off against all the odds and laughing in the
face of adversity!
Please tune in next week for the
next instalment when this reviewer will be visiting The Sonic Cathedral to
check out the Jim Reid and Morning After Girls, and doing his utmost to avoid
getting lost and suppressing any actions that may result in mind-crippling
hangovers the following day – I’m fucking paying for this today I can tell you.
