Blog: Grumpiness: DENIED

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Myself, The Head Of My Guiness, and a PAL went off to The Spitz last night, to see Boo Hewerdine. Me and herself have seen him MANY times and this is because he is DEAD GOOD, so were RATHER excited at the prospect of seeing him again, especially when we arrived to find he was going to be playing with a band. New thing!

When we got into the venue itself I was surprised to find the venue was set out like a JAZZ PLACE i.e. with loads of tables set up around the stage. I'm sure this is all well and good in theory and that promoters thing it is going to generate an BOHO ATMOS, but in actuality it's just A Bit Annoying, as the tables get snaffled up really early by wine guzzling chin nestling patiently nodding iron bladdered JAZZ GITS, leaving the vast majority of the audience to huddle together at the back of the room getting in each other's way when they want to go to the bar for GOOD HONEST NON-WINE-BASED DRINKS (Wine! drink it at HOME, not at a GIG!). I think it's a GOOD idea to have seats at a venue, but have them at the BACK so that people who are TIRED from standing at the front (AS NATURE INTENDED) can go and have a little rest.

Thus i was immediately put into a slight GRUMP, not helped by the first act on, who was playing some sort of Exotic Guitar. As ever on such occasions it was Quite Interesting for the first few minutes, as he was making some Strange Noises with it, helped by the fact it seemed to have tambourine bells all along the bottom which, as he danced around, sounded dead good. HOWEVER, it appears that JAZZ is the same where'ere you wander as it went on FAR TOO LONG without actually getting any more interesting/exciting/fun, so i was relieved to find we'd got there towards the end of the set. I know some people like that sort of thing, but personally i'm more interested in people UTILISING whatever TOOLS they choose to do something GOOD, rather than just attending an Instrument Demonstration Seminar.

GRUMP LEVELS: INCREASING! After that the second support was a very nice young GEL who appeared to have come hotfoot from pony club to entertain us. I am AWARE that i am slightly BIASED against POSH people (it is a deep pyschological problem which i am attempting to combat with forced immersion in SELFRIDGES) so thought to myself "Come on now Comrade Hibbett, give her a chance" and struggled to do so as she interspersed jolly what-ho chat with EXTREME COD-AMERICAN WARBLING, GRUNTING, BELLOWING and agonising lengths of GUTTURAL TRILLING. Yes, GUTTURAL TRILLING! It is hard to imagine i know, but that is what was happening.

As ever at these sort of things, people went WILD for it. "Beautiful!" shouted out a group at the back, who i CORRECTLY (i checked later) guessed would be harsh looking middle aged women, angrily applauding A Young Woman In Rock. During my early days in ROCK you would very OFTEN meet middle aged women, angrily applauding A Young Woman In Rock at gigs, but they seem to be a bit of a dying specied, so it was nice to see them again and note that they are still wearing great big hand woven jumpers and BIG SPECS. There was also a large smattering of WOBBLY JAZZ GUYS who seemed VERY eager indeed, but i guess that's just WOBBLY JAZZ GUYS for you.

Suffice to say, i didn't much like it and, in conference with the rest of my party, I found us to be a small but united fraternity within the audience in general. GRUMPINESS therefore was RAGING through my veins, so when Mr B Hoowerdine came on stage I was ready to HARRUMPH.

Imagine my RELIEF, then, when he went on to be UTTERLY GRATE for the next hour or so. As ever, it was a great big juicy SLAB of TUNE, honestly sung, that made me a) GRIN b) want to emulate and c) fight back more than one MANLY TEAR. There's a kind of songwriting (and it's obviously not the kind that I can do) that goes ABOVE words and literal meanings and GRABS you right in the heart, making you feel all emotional without really knowing why, and that's the sort of thing he does.

Most of the songs were familiar from the other times he'd seen him, and they sounded surprisingly the same even though AUGMENTED by a band, so I guess that means they were just dead good at playing them. The best bits were the drummers. Yes - DRUMMERS PLURAL! The pair of them sat on BOXES which they hit with sticks and beaters and brushes or SLAPPED in concert with each other - it sounds a bit daft but it was REALLY good, especially the way they seemed to be DANCING with each other when things got a bit HECTIC. It was ACE!

The other thing I really noticed this time is that Mr Hewerdine is NOT by any stretch of the imagination a "Great Singer". What I mean is, he doesn't seem to have a particularly big vocal range, the notes he sings don't go too far either way anyway, and he doesn't go in for any yelping or wobbling or extending words much beyond their alloted syllables, he just SINGS them, and does so in a lovely straightforward way that makes you feel that he really MEANS what he's singing, without ever getting over-earnest about it. To put it another way, it's REALLY REALLY GOOD.

THUS, by the end of the set all was JOY and HAPPINESS and the room buzzed with a feeling of GOODWILL to all men, also PEACE ON EARTH. GRUMPINESS was dissolved and it felt, actually, a bit CHRISTMASSY. Maybe that was just the Guiness, i don't know, but as we strode out into the cold night air i felt WARM within. Boo Hewerdine: he's dead good!

posted 23/11/2006 by MJ Hibbett

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