Having expected to miss all their dates on the current tours, an unexpected last minute-ish plan formed to catch The Burning Hell at Arden Road Social Club on Friday and The Wave Pictures at the Trades Club in Hebden Bridge on Saturday.
Silly trains, 1:30am kebab shops in Leeds city centre, spectacularly vomiting drunks on the last TPE out of
dodge Leeds and getting home after 3am and the Halifax trip was absolutely worth it. Friendly welcome from the promoter on the door - they were relatively impressed with Dean travelling from Darlo for the evening, but he was trumped by the guy who'd come from Brighton. Nice enough venue although, as Deano commented, it was more set up for a bingo night than a gig. And at the top of a bloody big hill. They seem to get some decent acts in though, so I'll probably keep an eye on it...
First support was a solo slot by the BH's bassist, Nick Ferrio who I quite liked but maybe didn't see at his best - I suspect it was a tough-ish space/audience for a bloke with a guitar and a turn for the whimsical. Good call from the venue to switch the glitter ball for this one
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHiix4p1mZ8https://youtu.be/yHiix4p1mZ8Next up was From the Woods, who were OK (although I couldn't make out a word and generally speaking the lyrics are Quite Important to me) and I wouldn't have minded listening to a song or three by them. Shame they seemed to do the same one on repeat, really. Shortening both support sets and getting the headliners on rather earlier would, I think, have improved the evening generally as well as meaning I could have been home by 1am not 3. But The Burning Hell were utterly splendid while working damn hard to get what felt like a very mixed (and very talk-y) crowd on side and on their feet, and did so most successfully - especially when they came back for an encore and threw in a new one, a quiet little duet by Mathias and Ariel telling the story of when they met. I don't think it had a title. Bloody good it was. Seen 'em three times in three spaces now and I think that might have been my favourite so far. Plus also they 'liked' my facebook comment.
A Saturday of dashing about meant a later-than-ideal train to Hebden Bridge, straight up a bloody cliff face (the innocuous sounding Birchcliffe Road) to find the hostel and drop off a bag then more or less straight back down the hill to town where we found Peter, or he found us, and we headed to the Trades Club. The running order on the wall made it clear that Peter would have a choice of seeing the main attraction or catching his train home and made me very glad that the scheduled bus replacement service out of Leeds after midnight meant that I was staying overnight and didn't have to make that decision. Turns out that the event was basically a promo for an upcoming local festival, and they'd booked three bands of differing flavours from the line up for that.
First up, Bird to Beast. Bloke with assorted stringed things and singing, woman with a voice and occasional keyboards. Oh, and a tambourine for one of them. I liked her best when she was playing something as the "expressive" hands were a touch off putting. "Accomplished" was the word that sprang to mind - I'd turn up to listen to them again, possibly even as headliners, although I wouldn't catch a train for them. Astonishingly good for the opening act in a three band line up, I started to wonder if we might be in for a real corker of a night. They were followed by something-with-Foxy-in-the-name, who were loud, numerous and easily young enough to be my kids. Seemed to be going down well with much of the audience but I was not unpleased when the assembled company suggested retiring to the other room where conversation was just about possible. Apparently this meant that we missed the punch up on the dance floor, which is always an added bonus.
Regretfully Peter stuck to his plan to catch the train to make a tram connection and get home and so missed the Wave Pictures who were, as on every occasion that I've seen them, jolly splendid indeed, and gave us a good hour and a quarter which meant I was very glad indeed to have that bed in the hostel as we were way beyond last train territory. I still think I really shouldn't like them all that much, with their guitar solos and the drum solos and the male vocalists which are none of 'em things that usually flick my bic. But I really like them anyway
