Sunday 10 January 2010

gigsplurge 26: gold blade etc., december 2000

the GMS gigsplurge almost reached the end of 2000 by the end of 2009, and generated a lot of japanese spam in the process. a victory that you, reader, are welcome to share.

Gold Blade, Holy Roman Empire, Twister, Toby Slater, Bullingdon Arms, Oxford, 14 December 2009

amidst the ruins of britpop and in the absence of anything else particularly coherent, a pattern has emerged across 2000: ageing punky greasers with impressive hair playing deranged blues riffs to hopeful punters (liquor for Rowland S. Howard). hence, to round off 2000 we have gold blade, mancunian motormouth punk pundit john robb's nation of ulysses bootboy band, sham 69-ing christmas carols and hitting the stage from a broom cupboard in the corner of the bullingdon arms, the better to underline their grinning goon strummer-isms.

long since having retreated to bare-chested punk revival all-dayers, the blade in their prime (that is, the first one-and-a-half albums) rivalled king prawn in their toilet-venue omnipresence, and in their ability to inspire concurrent pogoing and frugging in the moshpit--the more delightful at the height of nu-metal and the NIN stomp. this gig was booked under the aegis of our then-online mag, full; but with the website stagnating (writing crap on the internets never being the most rewarding) it was also the launch of our promoting venture, strictly hardcore--named, appropriately, after the blade's single, the logo written on an arm like richey manic. it's beginning to look like we had an unhealthy belief in this sort of stuff.

support from the holy roman empire and twister, already covered in this series, and from toby slater, who sang songs locally and i believe still does.

No comments: