The Magic Bandthe Garage, London

You never expect to get to watch some bands. Sometimes they fall by the wayside before you get the chance to see them in the flesh. Sometimes you just have to accept that it wasn’t meant to be.

When a band splits about twelve years before you had even heard of them, then the chances of ever watching them play are, shall we say, quite remote. Which just makes it all the more astounding that I’m here watching a bunch of old men in varying stages of mid-life crisis, and that’s just the audience. Boom boom.

Bad jokes aside, it is worth taking the time to say that entering the Garage tonight felt like walking into a back issue of Q. The almost exclusively male crowd is easily the wrong side of its forties. Those of them that look like they earn a living appear to do so as accountants or finance directors of small, inconsequential companies. The rest of the crowd look as if they’ve never earned a living in their lives: pitiful little men with the faces of 50 year olds atop the scrawny bodies of malnourished children. Men who can be heard muttering, “think of all the girlfriends who never got Beefheart, who said it was all unlistenable shit, but they’re still going strong today, shows how much they knew about music”.

At this point I’d to draw your attention to the header at the top of this page. The Magic Band. At the Garage. Not at Wembley Arena, Finsbury Park, Brixton Academy, or even the Barbican or the Shepherd’s Bush Empire, (the last two both venues that they played last year). This is the Garage. This is a world tour whose only UK date is a 500 capacity former sweatbox in North London. So let’s not get too carried away about their success. There’s a reason that Don van Vliet once sang ‘My Human Gets Me Blues’, and this may well be it.

Ah, yes. Don van Vliet, the man without whom none of this would be possible. An artist, musician and musical visionary. The man who locked his band in a house for three months while he taught them ‘Trout Mask Replica’. The captain that fled his ship in 1982, before it had even started to sink, so he could run off to live as a hermit in the desert and concentrate on painting.

Also, there’s a problem with the price here. The Magic Band may have become more than just a curiosity again, but at £20 a ticket, they’re still very much a luxury. Which is why the crowd tonight is so ridiculously homogenous. Why would you spend £20 on a ticket for a gig at the Garage, when you could take that money, go to Fopp, or wait for one of the more overpriced high street stores to have one of their countless sales, and buy Beefheart’s best albums for that same sum.

But anyway, 491 words in, and still no mention of the gig. I should get on. The most frustrating thing about all this is that we’ve reached a stage in musical evolution where the Magic Band actually make sense. In a time where free-jazz is no longer mentioned in the same sentence as the bogey man, where Radiohead reach number one with albums of unlistenable wibble and the best busker in London plays guitar like he’s David Pajo, I think that people are ready for the Magic Band.

During a set lifted largely from the ‘Clear Spot’ and ‘Trout Mask Replica’ albums, there are songs that sound as if they could have been released by any of the better post-rock bands in the last few years. ‘On Tomorrow’ wouldn’t sound out of place at a Tortoise gig, while Rockette Morton’s preceding bass solo (yes, I know, a fucking bass solo, but, man, you had to be there) could put Billy Mahonie to shame.

Obviously, on these and other instrumental songs, the absence of Don van Vliet is an irrelevance. Elsewhere, John ‘Drumbo’ French does such a Beefheart impression so convincing, even on the vocal only ‘Orange Claw Hammer’, that anyone not familiar with the history probably wouldn’t have guessed that French was only ever a drummer in the original incarnation of the band.

What is obvious though is that the Magic Band are still capable of knocking out the delta-blues-voodoo-stomp-swamp-rock better than anyone else. They lurch their way from one masterpiece to another, from ‘Circumstances’ to ‘Steal Softly Thru Snow’. Though they do then ruin things slightly with ‘Evening Bell’, a two-minute piece for one guitar that has no obvious rhythm and makes absolutely no bloody sense at all. But then, contrary bastards that they are, they follow this with ‘Electricity’ and ‘The Floppy Boot Stomp’ and everything is peachy again.

In the end, my only complaint is that I’d prefer it if Drumbo didn’t take so much time out to between songs to talk to the crowd (oh, and that they don’t play ‘Ice Cream For Crow’ or ‘Ashtray Heart’, but you can’t have everything). Okay, so he’s being polite and wants to tell people some of the background about the songs, but it would be good to hear this set played Blues Explosion style, with only a howled song-title and the occasional “1, 2, 3, 4” separating each track. Though obviously, the fact that a large number of Magic Band songs are either so syncopated or contain three different time signatures means that they’d be impossible to count in.

But as the band come back on to encore with ‘Brickbats’, any such grumbles are left far behind. The Magic Band still sound mighty and, against a lot of odds, I got to see the evidence up close and personal.

Billy Mahonie, Trans AmIslington Academy, London

There’s an odd crowd here tonight. It could be because most the press that Trans Am get is in the style magazines. Perhaps the Islington Academy just attracts a ridiculous number of people that just go there to be seen, rather than to see the bands. Or maybe Dave Stewart’s mates are just so old that Alzheimer type disease has set in, and they’ve popped in to see him, having forgotten that the aged duffer doesn’t own the place any more.

Whatever the reason for this bizarre mix of fashion victim and haggard former hippies, there’s a pair of white-haired sexagenarians eagerly pointing a range of cameras at Billy Mahonie for the duration of their set. The truly sad thing about this though is the fact that when they first launch into one of their many songs whose titles continue to elude me, there are very few other people paying any attention to a band who are quite possibly Britain’s best post-rock troupe.

Instead, while Mr and Mrs Fred Hale (the oldest man in the world, do try to keep up) work their through film after film, most of the crowd have a collective chat, a particularly loud chat that constantly threatens to drown out Billy Mahonie in a sea of babble. Seriously, some people just can’t recognise greatness even when it’s waving intricate and elegant interlocked riffs in their face. But as the volume builds, Mahonie start to win over the ignorant onlookers. By the time they go all Fugazi throwing an epileptic fit on their pugnacious closer ‘Düsseldorf’, they’re an angular and finely honed colossus that is impossible to ignore.

It could be because Mahonie were so good, or have something to do with me being so tired, but Trans Am don’t really cut it tonight. Each time I’ve seen them before, I’ve been transfixed by their barrage of droning synths, growling bass and staccato drumming, but right now, something just isn’t clicking.

The crowd has started to leave, taking the atmosphere with them. Trans Am bassist Nathan Means’ close physical resemblance to Vernon Kaye is getting to me more than usual (the orange mesh trousers aren't really helping), and the set is too repetitive, the songs too derivative of each other, to hold my interest for long. It’s getting late, I’ve got to get up for work in the morning, and I’m feeling dehydrated, and no matter what they do now, Trans Am aren’t going to escape the fact that they were outclassed and upstaged by Billy Mahonie.

Blonde Redheadthe Scala, London

It’s nights like these that make it all seem worthwhile. I don’t really know how it happened but I spent the last nine months in some sort of musical coma, oblivious to all that was going on around me, with no idea what was happening, when albums were being released or who was on tour.

I’d become disillusioned with gigs and was finding more comfort in James Ellroy novels than in smoky, dank disgusting venues with shit sound and overpriced drinks. Then Blonde Redhead finally came to town. Having spent so much time on the fringes, I was almost unsure how to react. It had been so long since I’d felt the excitement, the anticipation of knowing that I was going to able to go and watch a band that I totally love.

And then, as the staccato twin riff of ‘Melody Of Certain Three’ kicked in, it was as if I’d just had witnessed an epiphany. This was what I had been missing. It wasn’t that I was just burnt out, or had seen too many bands. I’d just seen so many merely average bands, that I’d almost forgotten what it was like to experience such brilliance, such genius first-hand.

It’s there in the way that they fuse the art-rock styling of Sonic Youth with the fervour of Fugazi, a perfect mix of poise and passion. Music that not only sends shivers down your spine but raises the hair on your head and sends the endorphins coursing through your mind. And they don’t just pull off such a feat once, the exhilaration builds with every song, from the interlocked guitars of ‘Futurism Vs. Passéism’, through a super-charged ‘Maddening Crowd’ and into an especially sparse and haunting rendition of ‘In Particular’.

They even get away with an encore of ‘In An Expression Of The Inexpressible’, on the record the only of their songs that doesn't induce a feeling of blissful awe. Live, however, it’s a twisting spiralling juggernaut of a song, as Kazu Makino saves her best Yoko Ono howl for the finale, screaming her near inarticulate desperation over Amedeo Pace’s jagged, bruising guitar hooks. It shouldn’t work, it’s just too far from what even the more musically liberated onlookers would describe as accessible, or maybe even listenable, but tonight it’s the most mesmerising climax that you can imagine.

Blonde Redhead have set the standard by which I will judge every other band this year. As much as I’d like to proven wrong, there are few bands whom I can imagine managing to scale such heights.

Mission of Burma, the Playwrightsthe Institute of Contemporary Art, London

There are few things as disappointing or soul-destroying as watching your luminaries embarrass themselves in front of your eyes. And few things are as likely to initiate a publicly humiliating fall from grace as a seminal band reforming as a way of dealing with their collective mid-life crisis.

The Velvet Underground were a bitter and petulant abomination of their past self, Arthur Lee has only managed to get away with it by drafting in a new band to pose as Love, and we’re all waiting with baited breath to see what happens with the Pixies. So when Mission of Burma got back together to play All Tomorrows Parties a couple of years ago, you may have feared that it was all set to go horribly wrong.

But before we talk about the old, let’s look at the new. While the Playwrights may not yet have broken into the public consciousness, with a Careless Talk Costs Lives tour behind them and high profile support slots like this, they’re making a damn good go of it. Where last years’ ‘Good Beneath The Radar’ was loaded with a post-folk air and chiming guitars, they’ve gone and got hard on our ass. The new songs punching out into the crowd as singer Aaron Dewey snarls his way through ‘Guy Debord Is Really Dead’ and guitarist Ben Shillabeer jerks around the stage, battering tunes out of his long-suffering instrument.

Having to follow such an adept performance, it seems even less likely that Mission of Burma will be able to pull this off. But age doesn’t seem to have taken its toll on them, and while Roger Miller spends the first of tonight’s two sets looking uncomfortable on stage, this is about as close to a triumphant comeback as you can get with the ICA’s dodgy PA system.

The PA not only muddies the sound disgracefully, it highlights how much more interesting, and tuneful, Clint Conley’s songs are than Miller’s, and also how much better a voice he has. While the likes of Miller’s fast and rasping ‘Fun World’ start to blur into an almost unidentifiable mess through the distorted PA, Conley’s ‘Academy Fight Song’ and ‘That’s How I Escape My Certain Fate’ still sound great.

When ‘That’s When I Reach For My Revolver’ breaks through the fuzz and hiss of the overloaded system it still sounds as fresh and vital as it must have on it’s release 21 years ago. Mission of Burma have proved that it is possible for a bunch of middle-aged men to return without making tits of themselves. Let’s just hope that the Pixies have been paying close attention.

GravenhurstArts Cafe, Camden Monarch, London

There are two sides to every story. Newton proved the existence of equal and opposite reactions, Chinese philosophy gave us the Yin and the Yang, Freud based his theories of personal development on the twin drives of Eros and Thanatos, and Robert Louis Stevenson had Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Gravenhurst, as with many other singer-songwriters (sorry, I know that that’s a bit of a dirty word), deals with the age-old dichotomy between the acoustic and the electric guitar.

Maybe a brief history lesson is in order at this juncture. Once upon a time there was a band called Assembly Communications. Their sound was pitched somewhere between the desolate beauty of Red House Painters, the effects-pedal driven onslaught of Ride’s early singles and soaring vocals reminiscent of Art Garfunkel. They built themselves a solid fan base around their adopted hometown of Bristol, took In The City by storm and turned down record deals. But then, for reasons that won’t be entered into here, the band split.

After a while singer Nick Talbot started Gravenhurst as a solo adventure. The understated majesty of Assembly was still there, only this time the thundering guitars had been replaced by a lone, fragile acoustic guitar. But it seems that this wasn’t enough. Alongside the solo effort, a new electric Gravenhurst were also being assembled (ahem). So now, depending on the night, you can have either the solo acoustic Gravenhurst or the full electric movement of the three-piece Gravenhurst.

If it’s Tuesday, it must be the Arts Café. Full band, electric guitars and effects-pedals. Last time I saw the electric Gravenhurst, I wanted to cry. The music was just too beautiful, the longing so perfectly expressed. Tonight, however, the tears are nowhere near my eyes. They’ve been replaced with an overriding feeling of joy. This is music that moves me. Even though new songs comprise the majority of the set, there’s a welcome sense of familiarity to everything they play. I feel like I already know these songs, that I’ve lived with them, that I’ve already taken solace in them.

Whatever the reasons for the formation of a full band, it’s strange seeing the difference in Nick’s demeanour from one night to the next. With the band he looks relaxed, comfortable being on stage. But the night after at the Monarch, he seems nervous, awkward as he stands there alone, the subject of the crowd’s undivided attention.

Musically, there’s not a lot to choose between the two sets. The songs differ (only ‘Damage II’ and ‘Blacks Holes In The Sun’ feature in both), but this is mainly because there hasn’t been yet time to for the band to learn them all, or for the songs to be re-arranged. But, electrically, ‘Black Holes…’ is so mighty that as a set-closer it’s perfect. As Nick stops singing, the guitars arc into a crescendo of wailing noise, building louder and louder, almost in direct retaliation to the delicate sound that has gone before. ‘The Diver’ still sends shivers down my spine, but the spookiest moment of the two sets has to be Nick’s solo rendition of Hüsker Dü’s ‘Diane’. Originally a barked and frantic tale of rape, when stripped down to a single guitar, the song takes on a new, and somehow much more sinister, air, as if the victim’s suffering has been made more prominent by the reduction in volume.

It’s been said that there are two sides to all of us. If that’s the case, then surely there’s room in your heart for the two sides of Gravenhurst as well.

Querelle, Controller.ControllerBarden’s Boudoir, London

Right now, I’m ready to worship Querelle. No one else seems to have lifted the best bits from two of my favourite bands – Sonic Youth and Blonde Redhead – and yet can be seen playing a 300 capacity in a basement underneath a carpet shop in Stoke Newington to celebrate their signing with the Sink and Stove record label. So it’s incredibly frustrating that whoever took their soundcheck tonight doesn’t seem to hold them in such high regard as I do.

And, judging by the mood onstage, it seems that I’m not the only person that has an issue with the muddy sound. Try as they might, there doesn’t seem to be anything that Querelle can do it. Things just aren’t going their way, all the low-end is bouncing back off the ceiling and walls and what should have been a smart, clipped sound is rendered flat and toneless. But even through the sludge, you can hear that there’s something beautiful trying to force its way out. It’s there in the way that ’Nothing Lost Nothing Found’ sounds like an art-rock onslaught on Joy Division’s ‘Atrocity Exhibition’, all cavernous drumming and a jagged guitar that keeps dipping tantalisingly into feedback without ever quite breaking the boundary that divides music and noise.

Fortunately things go better for their new label-mates, Controller.Controller. On record, they sound like Pretty Girls Make Graves car-jacking Lomax but live they mutate into a deep-down low and nasty ten-legged punk-funk machine intent on turning their crowd into braying slaves to their fidgety staccato rhythm.

Imagine what the Rapture would sound like now if, rather than getting all loved up and trancey, they had followed up ‘Out Of The Races And Onto The Tracks’ by filling out their sound and delivering on the promise that the Gang of Four stylings that that song had promised. If, instead of making their songs all polished and shiny, they’d unleashed a barely contained rampant beast and gone on to record the album of adrenaline-fueled disco-punk for which we’d all been hoping. That mythical album would sound just like Controller.Controller.

Not only that, but they’re every bit the real deal live as well. Okay, so the stage isn’t exactly on the large size, but it’s literally seething. Singer Nirmala Basnayake is careening across the front of the stage, shaking her ass to her band’s insidious and infectious rhythms. Behind her, jerking and lurching guitarists are jumping on and off the stage, trying to avoid a drum kit that is being played so hard that it’s bouncing across the stage. The drummer meanwhile, clad in a balaclava and goat mask ensemble, is smashing out the beat on the ceiling.

It’s as if you’re witness to a funk-punk Bacchanalia, there’s nothing that you can do to stop yourself from getting caught up in the heady exuberance of it all. It’s time to give in to the moment and lose all control.

John Parishthe Spitz, London

John Parish has always been something of an enigma. One of those people whose name you’ve always known but, other than ‘Dance Hall At Louse Point’, his 1996 collaboration with PJ Harvey, very few people outside of his loyal following actually know anything that he’s done, a situation exacerbated by his seemingly random appearances of other people’s records.

Similarly, it’s also quite hard to know what to expect of Parish. Five years ago, he was playing with a thirteen-piece band, last time he headed off on tour he was down to just nine people. Tonight’s four-piece, including Parish, seems practically anorexic by comparison.

Another inconstant here is Parish’s musical style, which changes as regularly as the number of beds on his tour bus. ‘Dance Hall At Louse Point’ was a brash, howling translation of PJ Harvey’s solo work. He flitted through pared down rustic folk before adopting the expansive textural landscapes of ‘How Animals Move’. More recently Parish seems to have settled, for the time being at least, for an intimate-sounding barroom blues, in part reminiscent of Tindersticks, if they had stripped of their strings, horns and unfathomable vocals, or the ‘Sticks’ American peers, the National.

But this current incarnation of the Parish band demands an intimate setting, and that is the last thing that he’s granted tonight. A large part of the crowd is restless – that large part obviously not including the substantial number of people that leave before Parish sheepishly saunters onstage more than an hour later than expected. Although not quite an ungodly time of night, it’s far too close to the witching hour and the new go-slow stylings struggles to connect with those who remain. Proceedings also aren’t helped by the fact that the new electric line up of tonight’s support band, Gravenhurst, have just played a spellbinding and exceptionally loud set that is still reverberating around the venue.

In fact, when all these factors are put together, Parish is just too underwhelming tonight. Anyone that came along hoping for the six guitar art-rock ensemble of a few years ago has been left disappointed and unfortunately that seems to be the overriding emotion tonight. Looks like Parish’s enigmatic status is safe for the meantime.