Week 33 – Friday 19th August – Brother Steve – Clwb Ifor
Bach, Cardiff - £5
“Only now do I appreciate your commitment, and the sacrifice you two
brave, handsome men
have made. . .”
have made. . .”
These solemn words were uttered close to midnight by Ryan of
Brum, who’d joined Sandro and me for what would go down as one of the less
glorious nights in the Gigaweek calendar. Mr of Brum, who’d been spoiled by the
NME Shockwaves gig of Week 7, Sandro’s favourite Spanish archer in Week 12 and
the masterful mania of Week 21, finally began to appreciate the true nature of
Gigaweek and its punishing demands on its participants.
As Sandro put it so eloquently, the thirty third week of
Gigaweek threw up a dirty turd of a gig. Ryan himself described it as worse than
genital warts. I thought it was okay.
The night had begun innocently enough, with Ryan and I
catching a bus into town to meet Sandro, oblivious of what was to follow. We
were headed to see an unsigned band from Llantwit Major named Brother Steve, who were playing
downstairs at Clwb Ifor Bach while
the slightly more established Pop Will
Eat Itself played upstairs.
I’d never heard of either band, while Ryan of Brum couldn’t
quite put his finger on the name of the PlayStation game he knew PWEI from and considering tickets for Brother Steve were a tenner cheaper, pop
could do whatever it wanted to itself as far as I was concerned.
“Why are they called Brother
Steve?” I asked brother Sandro and
the internet, but neither could give me an answer. As far as I could tell, none
of the members of the band were called Steve and none of them were brothers.
Sadly, it was a mystery that would remain unsolved. “Why are Pop Will Eat Itself called Pop Will Eat Itself?” you may
justifiably ask but PWEI is at least
a better acronym to have than BS.
Marginally.
-------
We met Sandro at Dempsey’s for a pre-gig pint. As I had
half an eye on Saturday’s sporting exertions there were no Brothers Ciders
tonight and I stuck to avocado and guava juice instead. Honestly.
At Clwb, the supporting band Tequila Dealer (who’d toyed with the name Off-License) were already playing as we entered. Also hailing from
the hotbed of rock that is Llantwit Major, they played hard hitting,
unapologetic rock music and their front-man was a bit of a character. Dressed
in a white suit complete with a tie, donning a white fedora and sporting
shoulder length hair and an unkempt beard, whether intentional or not, he was undoubtedly
rocking the Sandro look.
The seats we’d taken
up were on a slightly raised platform to the side of the stage, away from the dozen
or so others present, which Ryan of Brum commented made him feel like an X-factor
judge, though he still had a soul. Allegedly.
As well as looking
the part, Tequila Dealer’s front man
wasn’t averse to the odd yelp or rock star pose. He had plenty of personality
and humour, speculating how Llantwit Major
would cope without the two bands for the night. “With the 8 of us gone, the
other two will be rioting.”
The only negative
aspect of our privileged position of power was the fact that with the speakers
in such close proximity, tinnitus was inevitable, especially with the ear
destroying sounds of Tequila Dealer.
-------
“Oh brother, where art thou?” we wondered between bands,
before a disturbing sight caught my attention. I noticed that Sandro was
suddenly wearing a horrible v-next T-shirt and his belt buckle was nearly at
belly button height, while Ryan had adopted a bizarre Geordie accent and
slipped into a short skirt. I suddenly felt the urge to speak in a squeaky
Irish voice, tell a brother how much like Lenny Henry he is and start talking
about Boyzone and Westlife, but fortunately Brother Steve appeared and stopped me in
my tracks.
The brotherhood of Brother
Steve was leaner than the Tequila
Dealers, which was surely a good omen. They opened with a song called ‘Stupid Stunner’ which was pleasant
enough, though the front man’s efforts to encourage people to approach the
stage were in vain. The room had steadily filled up but was far from full,
which made his job all the more difficult.
He didn’t quite have the personality to engage with the
sparsely populated room in the same way as Tequila
Dealer’s white suit wearing cheerleader, his high water mark being set
before a song called ‘Addiction’.
“We’ve all had an addiction of some kind,” he said looking around the room. “His
is cock!” he said nodding towards one of the members of Tequila Dealer, inspiring immature laughter from simpletons like me.
“I think you’ve all heard of this one,” the singer said of their debut single ‘Hot Diggity Dog’, which was either a gross overestimation of their
success so far, or an acknowledgment that most of those present were friends or
family. Needless to say, Sandro and Ryan were unimpressed, by the title, the
lyrics and the tune itself. I thought it was okay.
Someone who did enjoy it is ‘themancalledbob’, a contributor
to the comments section of the single’s video on YouTube, who had this to say:
There is no finer tribute than that.
-------
After they’d finished
and left the stage, my fellow judges were in the process of pitilessly mocking
their efforts, when the singer approached us and introduced himself. He was handing out free CDs containing their
single ‘Hot Diggity Dog’, and I was
surprised that Sandro didn’t offer him money to take it back.
He seemed like a very
friendly chap, chatting to us for five or ten minutes. He was almost apologetic
about the atmosphere at the gig, as he bemoaned the way that the crowd avoided
the dance floor, but rather than mistaking us for talent show judges, he
thought we were in a band ourselves.
Ryan of Brum had
indeed gigged at Clwb himself as the
front-man of Everyone Must Win, a
band superior to Brother Steve in
every sense (except lyrically), but while
Sandro and I both look like band members (Maroon
5 and Kiss respectively), we had
to admit that sadly we weren’t.
We were asked if we’d
heard of them and what had attracted us to the gig. “Well, we do this thing; where we have to go
to a gig every single week of the year, and you were our very last resort. I
suppose we should have spent an extra tenner on PWEI,” was one of many things that went unsaid. Instead we just
declared ourselves to be fans of live music in general.
“They thought you
were shit,” I was tempted to say but resisted, after all Ryan and Sandro had no
desire to make Brother Steve’s life
any more difficult. They seemed like a decent bunch, and we were told that they
also do gigs as a covers band to earn enough money to keep going. There are all
kinds of bands who make it who the three of us are less than enthused by (I’m
looking at you Scouting For Girls), so
good luck to them.
I left clutching my BS CD, while Ryan and Sandro misplaced
theirs. All that was left for us was a post-gig discussion back at Dempsey’s to
determine what was the greatest song to contain the words ‘Hot Diggity Dog’. Admittedly,
suggestions were limited, but after careful deliberation the judges decided
that The Dandy Warhols’ ‘Get Off’ was
worthy of the honour, beating off stiff competition from a little known band called
Brother Steve. Apologies to Anton
Newcombe.
-------
August
30-5 - Wibidi - ✓
6-12 – Alice Russell - ✓
13-19 – Brother Steve - ✓
20-26 - Reading
27-2 - Reading
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