ALL THE LINKS ARE BACK ONLINE, INCLUDING THE LONG GONE ONES TO TRIGGERFINGER (Parkpop - 2009), THE HIVES (Coachella - 2012) AND MONOTONIX (Bottletree Café - 2011) ! ENJOY !! :-)

FROM THE VAULT - VIDEO OF THE WEEK

All right ! That's done ! I've finally managed to see live my four personal love-at-first-ear new big things of 2018 !! The fourth having to be postponed to 2019 since I couldn't make it to their first show here last summer as I was in Belgium for my first encounter with the third ! Busy period ! :-) I've already reported on some of them here and hope there will be more pro stuff coming out to make a true proper tribute to the bands soon. Chemtrails already got it below. Make-Overs (I struggled to see four times while they were around) are now touring intensively in their home country, South-Africa. Pamplemousse, from Reunion Island (!!), has just released their awesome noisy second album. And, Saint-Agnes (maybe my 2018 "wowest" moment !!) has got everything to rock the whole world with their debut album on May 3rd. Don't miss them out when they come round your place !! Enjoy !! 

INSIDE OUT - A Little Collection Of Loud Inner Outings - 2020

"INSIDE OUT" : 

01 - Drop Dead Red Rose - In The Woods - Glastsormbury Festival - Bradford - 11-07-20
02 - Kid Kapichi - Glitterati - First On Stage - Homeschoolfest - 10-05-20
03 - Saint Agnes - This World Ain't Big Enough - BadPond Festival - Brighton - 19-12-20
04 - Healthy Junkies - Mayday (with Frog) - Punk and Roll Rendez-Vous Festival - The Unicorn - London - 12-09-20
05 - Birdeatsbaby - The World Conspires - Punk and Roll Rendez-Vous Festival - 13-09-20

06 - FFOOSS - Sick Of Being 17 - dBs Studio - Utrecht - 17-05-20
07 - Pollypikpocketz - Waving The World Goodbye - Punk and Roll Rendez-Vous Festival - The Unicorn - London - 13-09-20
08 - Yard Act - Human Sacrifice - Hype Stage - Homeschoolfest - 10-05-20
09 - Do Nothing - Gangs - Hype Stage - Homeschoolfest - 09-05-20
10 - Tiffany Twisted - Sold My Soul - BooTV - The Engine Rooms - London - 24-10-20
11 - The White Ribbons - Same Old Mistakes - Punk and Roll Rendez-Vous Festival - 13-09-20
12 - A Void - She Threw Her Baby From The 7th Floor - Punk and Roll Rendez-Vous Festival - The Unicorn - London - 12-09-20
13 - Bexatron - Hex Your Ex - Punk and Roll Rendez-Vous Festival - The Comedy - London - 13-09-20
14 - Wargasm - Post Modern Rhapsody - Alt Stage - Homeschoolfest - 09-05-20
15 - Beach Riot - Tune in, Drop Out - First On Stage - Homeschoolfest - 10-05-20
16 - Gaffa Tape Sandy - Meat Head - The Smokehouse Presents - Ipswich - 11-12-20
17 - 45AcidBabies - Jetlag Jenny -The Sessions - Effenaar - Eindhoven- 22-11-20
18 - Bongloard - I Want It Now - HipFest - YMCA -Scheveningen - 22-11-20
19 - FFOOSS - Slayer - dBs Studio - Utrecht - 17-05-20

20 - Birdeatsbaby - Lady Grey - Punk and Roll Rendez-Vous Festival - 13-09-20
21 - Pollypikpocketz - Amnesia - Punk and Roll Rendez-Vous Festival.- The Unicorn - London - 13-09-20

22 - Healthy Junkies - Theft - Punk and Roll Rendez-Vous Festival.- The Unicorn - London - 13-09-20

Technical info  :
DVD Full Pro-shot

Video : Mpeg - 720 X 576 - 25 FPS - 16:9
Audio : Mpeg - 48000 Hz
Running Time : 87 mns
Size : 4,06 Go

Menu & Chapters - Artwork included

 

 

Inside... out. A halfway call for a better future ? Or a full way to describe 2020's mess ? When I come to think about it, this is rather unimaginable to consider I attended my last concert on February 8th. Well ... to be honest, I managed to sneak my ears into a backstreet venue for a new one on September 26th, during a too short lockdown "sunny spell". As well I would never have thought that going to the nice little French underground Schmoul festival in January would be the first and the last one I would head to this year !! Looking back, 2020 has been a total upside down version of what my nights "out" are usually like ! This might sound a damn fickle thought in regards of all the victims of this craziness around and to all the artists who need to hit a stage to earn a decent living. This is why I'm so grateful to those who tried to maintain a flimsy tie with us through stripped live shows. Those streaming things were definitely a light last resort for everyone, on and in front of the "stage" but it kept the fire alive and allowed us poor wretches to make up a bit for it. This dvd project was made to pay tribute to them. Among these, I wanted to honour this London (but not only !) underground scene that is so gorgeously portrayed in Neil Anderson & Keira Cullinane's photozine "98 Wounds", out there since 2013. Go and have a look at their site, it's worth it ! Order a few of their back issues if you can (couldn't resist to buy fifteen of them in one go when I discovered the project ! :-) ). I've always been into that kind of underbelly live shows full of lifeblood, rough energy and warmth. They often make the best memories and in that regard I have a great recollection of the first London "Siren Calling" festival I went to in August 2019. As such, a special thank goes here to Healthy Junkies for having held their eighth "Punk'n Roll Rendez-Vous" festival despite the grim conditions. It was a real treat to log on to these three streaming days, discovering great new bands in a very easy-going friendly atmosphere. Another big purveyor was the Homeschoolfest, set up by Dork magazine. Again, a huge series of acts on different "stages", some I knew and others totally fresh and new to me. Here and there on the dvd, you will also find some other live renditions I found worth listening to.

Personal highlights of the year ? : FFOOSS, a young fuzzy garage-trash-pop duo from Utrecht whose livestream really gave me hard time to edit as it was totally out of synch and virtually unwatchable. The image is still a bit blurry (initial low encoding I guess) but picture and sound fit much better now (if not perfect) and the energy shown by Sophia (guitar and singing) and Jannes (drums) is just infectious ! A band that definitely deserves to be followed in the next months and hopefully to be watched live with the coming release of their second album, "Millenium Friction". These two young guys are really talented as Jannes played guitar (!) in his own band, Bongloard (also on this dvd) while Sophia also leads her own group under the name of "45AcidBabies" whose first album was just on repeat at home throughout 2019 (and of course duly featured on this dvd as well) !

Second personal favourite on the bill : Birdeatsbaby, a music truly apart made of thunder and whispers, dark, complex with intertwined breaks and layers. Song making must take ages ! A kind of Muse meeting Kate Bush meeting Marilyn Manson meeting Nine Inch Nails meeting Rachmaninov. Mishkin's voice is just fantastic !! Seven albums since 2008 with huge critical acclaim coming along the last one,"The World Conspires". As many solo albums from Mishkin. Two live lps. A band close to their fans who are close to the band. Maybe not everyone's taste but definitely highly respectable and worthy of devotion due to the richness of their world. Can't understand this band isn't more widely praised.

Third, fancy a side kick of punk rock ? Pollypikpocketz is your man. First sight, first reaction : how can you possibly have an odder mixture of styles ?? But hell, it damn works !!!! Myura's Gwen-Stefani-like clear singing suits perfectly legendary Frog's Hugh Cornwell-like deep voice. The guy can't be missed in his perpetual fluorescent outfit and flashy yellow-dyed hair ! And he just has ants in his pants on stage while his hairy-moustached-always-sunglassed fellow Kiki shreds some 70s vibes riffs. Quite an unexpected line-up but the living proof that bringing different cultures together makes you better ! A true punk rocking machine !

At last, I couldn't miss to feature one of my best live memories of 2019 (the old world) : Saint Agnes. It was a close thing, as they hadn't played live since Valentine's day up to this last December 19th. I managed to cram one of their songs played on that occasion at the last minute.  

A "quick" overview of what's "inside" can be watched below (the out of synch seems to grow a bit by the end of the video but I couldn't fix it - it's not the case on the dvd ! - ... and I've just got enough ! ;-) )

 Don't know what's gonna come next here as the whole thing always take more time and work than expected but I hope it will definitely be inspired by some kind of experience ... OUTSIDE !! 

Keep safe, keep rocking, guys !!

Enjoy !

Cheers

Chac

 

DOLLY - "Froth The Pages" - Eurockéennes De Belfort (F) - 03-07-98  /  MANU - La Parenthèse - Baran Milé (F) - 09-06-18

DOLLY

Eurockéennes Festival - Belfort - 03-07-98

1 - Quand L'Herbe Nous Dévore

2 - Love And Money

3 - Les Mots

4 - Joe

5 - Garde Moi

6 - Je Ne Veux Pas Rester Sage

7 - Regis

8 - Around The Corner

9 - Partir Seule

10 - Fin D'Epoque

11 - Love And Money

MANU

Chapau d'Elles Festival - La Parenthèse - Baran Milé - 09-06-18

12 - Encore De Moi

13 - La Vérité

14 - Quand L'Herbe Nous Dévore

15 - Je Ne Veux Pas Rester Sage

16 - Entre Deux Eaux
Stéréolux - Nantes - 11-10-19 
17 - L'Horizon 

Technical info  :
DVD Full Pro-shot + Audience shot

Video : Mpeg - 720 X 576 - 25 FPS - 16:9
Audio : Mpeg - 48000 Hz
Running Time : 86 mns
Size : 3,99 Go

Menu & Chapters - Artwork included
 

Odd. Odd how this place has become something like shelter through hard times. Back in the days, so was the cathartic editing of  the IAMX Paris show I went to the week before the Bataclan attack. It looks as if the feeling is recurring once more. Yet, with the crazy time-consuming telecommuting that currently grounds me way too much in front of this screen, I'd just promised myself to do something, anything, else to take my mind off this mess. Well, ... I guess the depressing ongoing cancellations of all the shows and festivals I initially planned to go to finally got the upper hand. A form of catch-up compensation ? Similar to the one presently offered by festival websites revisiting their golden past ? Probably. Everyone's trying to make up for it.

But again, knowing all this is gonna make my nights shorter, which one to pick among all the projects I never find time to shape ? And why Dolly eventually ? Don't really know ... Maybe I got caught by the shows of their former singer I recently went to ? (those were the days !!) Or am I under the influence of a redeeming mission to restore  the true recognition they should have deserved ? My shame for never seeing them live too ? A mixed bag of all this I guess.

Roaming the local club scene as soon as 1989. the band started playing under the name of Dolly Bird, then Dolly and Co. In 1995, they turned to a flat Dolly moniker and played extensively until 2005, when their career sadly came to an end with the tragic departure of their bass player, Mika. Manu, lead singer, couldn't really get over the passing before 2008 when she released her first solo album, "Rendez-Vous" with its beautiful and moving self-titled song in tribute to their gone beloved friend. Nikko, Dolly's lead guitar, was still there. He now plays with another too often underrated band, Eiffel.

Anyway, all my gratitude goes here to Kevin and Alexandra Chamberlin who shared online some rare footage of Kevin's dad  and friends. Without them, little would have survived of Dolly's high-energy live heritage. What I've done here is just paying a humble tribute to a band I probably overlooked too much at the time. Other priorites, I guess. Other priorities, never you should have ! :-) I tried to brighten up the time-faded colours, to sharpen the edges here and there, ... Well, in times of high-resolution standards, it's far from being 4k but I hope this is a fair rekindled legacy of what Dolly could truly deliver on stage. The band had only released their first album at the time and the live rendering and the feedback from the audience are wow !!, already full of promises. Particularly regarding the day, the very hour, the set took place, when the "whole" country was glued to their TV set, watching our national football team struggling its way to the world cup semi-final. Manu is referring to it several times during the show. On the performance ground, Dolly 's music is some kind of stormy weather. Infuriated electric thunder followed by a sweet  sunny spell. Swirled in the midst of the hurricane, Manu's delicate voice seems to be the only light you can hold on to. She brings that sweet touch that makes the whole stand out. Sweet grunge ? Grungy sweetness ? Pick your temper. More, there is also some kind of Cobain-like moves in her playing.

 

As I said before, Manu is still playing today. She has released six albums so far, with mood swinging from collaborative unplugged sessions to more electric power-pop tunes, even taking a breather out  in an all-japanese sung ep. Everything in a quite DIY confidential way but always generous in the giving. I went and saw her a couple of times, from quite empty venues to fairly packed ones but everytime, humility and generosity were felt. This is this mix of two worlds you have here in the bonus section of this dvd, taken from my personal memories of the shows.

On a side note, I've just realised I'm releasing this Eurockéennes show dvd the very day the festival decides to cancel its 2020 edition. "These are dark times, there is no denying ..."  

Take care and enjoy, guys !!

Cheers

Chac

CHEMTRAILS - IDLES - QUEEN ZEE - "Are You Receiving ?" - KEXP International Clash Day - Studio 9294 - London - 06-07 - 02 - 19

CHEMTRAILS

Studio 9294 - London - 06-02-19

 1 - Watch Evil Grow

2 -  Headless Pin Up Girl

3 -  Ghosts of My Dead Cats

4 -  Vultures

5 -  Deranged

6 -  I’ll Never Be

7 -  Aeons

IDLES

Studio 9294 - London - 07-02-19

1 - Heel/Heal

2 - Queens

3 - Faith in the City

4 - 1049 Gotho

5 - Television

6 - Great

7 - Danny Nedelko

8 - Rottweiler

 

QUEEN ZEE

Studio 9294 - London - 07-02-19

1 - Victim Age

2 - Lucy Fur

3 - Loner (cut)

BONUS :

Hop Pop Pop Festival - Orleans - 14-09-18

4 - Hunger Pains (cut out) & Porno

5 - Gay Bar (Electric Six cover)

Technical info  :

DVD Pro-shot
Video : Mpeg - 720 X 576 - 25 FPS - 16:9
Audio : Mpeg - 48000 Hz
Running Time : 85 mns

Size : 3, 96 Go

Menu & Chapters - Artwork included

Hi folks ! It's been a while ! But back at last ... almost in the same circumstances as those of the last post ... a year ago !! As I've already said, my editing stuff has become erratic as I'm first not a professional editor and it really takes time and fu***** goddamned impenetrable glitches to get over to reach the idea in mind ! And second, I now rather spend my free time on the spot in a moshpit than being glued in front of a screen. But, well ... obviously, I got caught again !

Getting my hands back into that mess is always a bit of catch-22 situation. I have a long list of underground projects, picking one out is always frustrating, feeling sorry for those being left behind. What's going around at the moment often makes the difference. And this time, I foolishly decided to make my nights shorter again getting inspired by the highly appreciated Seattle-based KEXP broadcaster that decided to relocate its 4th International Clash Day to London for four days of live performances, paying tribute to the gang and to the fortieth anniversary of their iconic "London Calling" album. It was a real treat to watch all these bands live, brought home to you after your daily toil (huge thanks for this KEXP !). As I mentioned above, opportunity makes a thief and so, I decided to keep a souvenir of the event !

 

Every year, everyone's got their favourite personal pop song. You don't really know why you're so fond of it, it doesn't even sound appropriate to what you're used to listening to but right here, right now, it just clicks ! Back in 2017, I oddly got hooked by this one. Couldn't take it out of my head for weeks. My 2018 pop fav sounds more familiar to me and it was performed by the first band you have here : Chemtrails.

My first encounter with the band took shape once more thanks to our beloved local neighbours ! Everyone knows that Belgium is heaven on earth for festival-goers ! I try to pay visit to the country every year and 2018 was no exception to the rule. I'd planned a kind of a 10-day Belgian Rock Summer Tour during which I bounced back and forth from five different events. The one where I first met Chemtrails is definitely one of a kind ! A tiny home-brewed festival called "La Truite Magique", lost in the Ardennes woods with some stages finely nestled in trees, bordering a crystal green brook. An enchanting scenery "crowded" by a thousand, to the most ! I still just can't figure out how the hell the band ended up in this lovely remote place ?? For their unique date out of Britain !! Anyway, it was a blast to be there, freshly listening to a band I'd discovered only a few weeks before. (...) I was lucky, they played my three personal n°1 songs from them, still with this rough poppy lo-fi garage sound, half way between The Wannadies, Supergrass, The La's guitar and The B52s (well at least, these are the ones who are coming up right now !).

The second band featured here was probably the most expected of this 4-day celebration. Probably too the closest to the legendary Clash, both in terms of music and social content. Nothing's poppy here. Idles are bare, Idles are pounding, Idles are your nails screeching on the chalkboard. They're the roughest Clash but still, out of this cold raw roar and just like their glorious predecessors, rises a steady human rights message. Joe Talbot, the singer, never fails to call it back. The guy has already been through his lot of hardship which has eventually turned him into someone preaching solidarity and brotherhood while some others, under the same circumstances, would have sunk into withdrawal and bitterness. I already noticed this cold warmth when I first saw them, back in April 2017, in Bourges. A then blond Joe made every effort to make himself well understood, commenting the songs, putting them into perspective and making sure the message is well delivered ... by speaking French most of the time ! I also remember another thing he was quite used to be doing at the time obviously, spitting in the air and gulping down back the gob before it hit the ground ! Shivers in the audience ! :-)  

The third set is unfortunately incomplete. Something went wrong in the capture, the sound goes off after ten minutes or so and the video is sadly no longer available. That's a shame cause the guys were on fire and the band we have here is surely as wild as Idles, but in a more "glam" way. Their first album came out that same night at midnight and they truly delivered an electrifying show to be up to the event. I've already talked highly of Queen Zee here (in the "video of the week" section above), seen for the first time at this same special night in Bourges, but one year later than the Idles' one. To fill up the disc to the brim, I added some personal footage of my second encounter with the band, in September 2018, in Orleans, at the Hop Pop Hop festival, where this time Zena fronted the stage in a kind of  ... wedding dress !

Enjoy !

Cheers !

Chac 

IGGY POP - "Lust & Sin" - DVD X 2 - Last Nightclubbing In Paris - Studio 210- La Plaine Saint Denis (F) - 02-05-17 & THE STOOGES - Pinkpop Festival - Landgraaf (NL) - 27-05-07

DVD 1 :

IGGY POP 
The Last Nightclubbing In Paris - Studio 210 - La Plaine Saint Denis (F) - 02-05-17 - Part I

1 - Lust for Life

2 - Sister Midnight
3 - American Valhalla
4 - Sixteen
5 - In the Lobby
6 - Some Weird Sin
7 - Funtime
8 - Tonight
9 - Sunday
10 - German Days
11 - Mass Production
12 - Nightclubbing
13 - Gardenia
14 - The Passenger
15 - China Girl
16 - Break Into Your Heart
17 - Fall in Love With Me
18 - Repo Man

DVD 2 : 

IGGY POP 
The Last Nightclubbing In Paris - Studio 210 - La Plaine Saint Denis (F) - 02-05-17 - Part II

19 - Baby
20 - Chocolate Drops Introduction

21 - Chocolate Drops  
22 - Paraguay

23 - Success

 THE STOOGES

Pinkpop Festival - Landgraaf (NL) - 27-05-07
24 - Loose

25 - Down On The Street
26 - 1969
27 - I Wanna Be Your Dog
28 - T.V. Eye
29 - My Idea Of Fun
30 - Dirt
31 - Real Cool Time
32 - No Fun
33 - 1970
34 - Funhouse
35 - Skull Ring
36 - Little Electric Chair 

BONUS : 

37 -Iggy’s 60th Birthday & The Stooges ' reunion - An «Inrockuptibles» Documentary - 04-07

Technical info  :

DVD Pro-shot
Video : Mpeg - 720 X 576 - 25 FPS - 16:9
Audio : Mpeg - 48000 Hz
Running Time : 87 mns + 103 mns

Size : 4,04 + 3, 62 Go

Menu & Chapters - Artwork included

Ok, after a "girly" lapse ;-), back to testosterone. Mr Testosterone !! Mr James Newel Osterberg Jr. I've always wanted to pay a humble tribute to the man here. The opportunity makes the thief. A bad knee sprain is sticking me home, so let's make the most of my grounding. I won't have the cheek to give a quick warts and all report of Mr Pop's career. This would sound misplaced and abusive. Everyone knows Iggy. For his downs, wounds, bleedings and rock bottoms as well as for his ups, healings and resurrections. Even if I'm not much in his last "Post Pop Depression" album in which he rather turned himself into a sepulchral crooner (this voice !!), the man has never sold out and always done justice to himself in his countless projects. One of them, and probably one of my earliest rock recollection, is taking me back in 1977. I was a little boy then. That day, as we religiously did at the time, we all attended the one o'clock big news event.Unaware of the rough and wild music which was raging outside at the time, the final guest of this september 22nd edition was a guy unknown to me so far, Mr Iggy Pop. He was hosted by a quite popular presenter of the time who, I would learn later, was nothing but stranger to "nightclubbing" and was quite in tune with his time. (Check this out here !  :-o !! - glad to have known this era !).

So, for his first time on French TV and on his way to his show at "Le Pavillon de Paris" the day after, Iggy made a "high" staggering arrival on the set. Wearing a clown-lipstick smile, he soon got stripped to the waist, strutting around, asking in a luscious French "isn't that beautiful ?" :-o He also gave some entertaining anecdotes on his friendship with David Bowie and made a quite long speech on the art of wearing Japanese geta shoes !! At a peak viewing hour on a national TV channel, I was mesmerized. My mom went "who's that nut ?" :-) Times were changing. This surreal moment is here !! 

Oddly enough, watching again the footage, I realized it perfectly echoes the "Chocolate Drop" introduction Iggy made during his recent gig in Paris for "La Musicale" show, mainly on the first dvd. The time he had just spent in studio at the mythical Herouville castle-studio (where, among others, Grateful Dead, Pink Floyd, David Bowie, Elton John recorded some of their albums) back in 77 must mean a lot to him to make him talk about it again in his moving message to David Bowie forty years later.    

I've seen the godfather of punk quite a few times since and every time, the other high-profile young competitors who played the same venue got trashed.  I've always been amazed by this tense mix of primal animality and human generosity. Humanality ? And again here, whether it is in Paris or in Landgraaf, this overwhelming crave for feeling, touching the people, for swimming, drowning into them can be felt. " La Musicale" crowdsurfing almost ended up in a strip-tease performance and Pinkop's "invade the stage" calling on "Real Cool Time" and "No Fun" is just the incarnation of the security men's worst nightmare. Ahaa, the man, held back by the foot over the stage by one of them !! Some of the audience even ended up in their birthday suit !!     

Of course, for the fans of Queens Of The Stone Age (whose last two albums haven't turned me on either !) the "La Musicale" gig has a particular flavour as half of the band, including Josh Homme, is playing that night. Iggy seems to love this special series of "nightclubbing" shows as it was his third there after the 1999 and 2009 editions in which he sometimes performed some unusual duos ! On a side technical note, I got caught off-guard by the changing of year and labelled this concert as a 2016 one whereas I realized, while designing the front cover, it was actually held in 2017. Sorry for that, everything had been uploaded in the meantime (and it takes ages with my bandwidth !), I didn't redo the whole thing.   

I also added a quite interesting meeting I recorded at the time (2007), with the historic Stooges's line-up. I was quite surprised not finding it back on the net. The interview was made by the famous French mag "Les Inrockuptibles" for Iggy's 60th birthday and for The Stooges' back to business reunion. It contains some nice bits about their first meeting, their ahead out-of-synch sound to the times, their logo and record company, Iggy's Osgood-Schlattler dancing style, life on tour, writing songs, etc ... interspersed with other vintage and live records.

Well, here's the programme. Enjoy !

Cheers !

Chac 

BLACK HONEY - DREAM WIFE - HANDS OFF GRETEL - "Grrrrls" - Various venues - 2016-2017

BLACK HONEY 
"Song van het Jaar" - Tivoli Vredenburg Pandora - Utrecht - (NL) 6 16-12-16 
1 - All My Pride
2 - Hello Today
3 - Sleep Forever
4 - Spinning Wheel

5 - Corrine  
DREAM WIFE 
The Fox Theater - Oakland - CA (USA) - 22-03-17 
6 - Hey Heartbreaker
7 - Love Without Reason
8 - Kids
9 - Somebody
10 - Act My Age
11 - Let's Make Out

12 - FUU 
BONUS : 

BLACK HONEY - 22 d'Auron - "Printemps de Bourges" (F) - 15-04-16

13 - Bloodlust

14 - Black Honey

15 -You Said It All  
DREAM WIFE - "Chauffer Dans La Noirceur" Festival - Montmartin sur Mer (F) - 14-07-17

16 - Love Without Reason (cut in)

17 - Everything

HANDS OFF GRETEL - Toolmakers Studio - Sheffield (UK) - 04-09-17

18 - World Against She

19 - One Eyed Girl

20 - Bigger Than Me

21 - My Size

22 - Little Man (The Londoner - Barnsley - 17-06-16)

Technical info  :
DVD Pro-shot & Audience
Video : Mpeg - 720 X 576 - 25 FPS - 16:9
Audio : Mpeg - 48000 Hz
Running Time : 87 mns

Size : 4,03 Go

Menu & Chapters - Artwork included

Good to be back ! Must admit this summer may have been the rockingest summer I've ever had ! Twelve festivals, hundreds of shows, lots of discoveries, some confirmations, a few disillusions but on the whole a whale of a time spent in front of stages and in cramped bar backyards ! With so many nice memories in mind, I didn't really know who to start with for this new back-to-business kick. I've seen quite a bunch of full testosterone concerts over the last few months (see above) but don't know why, I feel like more oestrogenous as the winter breeze is drawing closer ! :-) So, ladies ... you're first !!

As frontwomen, Teri Gender Bender from Le Butcherettes and Duchess Says' Annie-Claude Deschênes are still my present-day craziest overpowering rule-the-stage favourites and even if the following ladies aren't the wildest amazons to have set foot on the platform, they are not to be left out either !!

 I first met Black Honey for one of their early dates in France, back in april 2016, for the "Printemps de Bourges" newcomers night. I'm used to going to that particular event every year and I must say the schedulers have flair as I've never been disappointed (I do remember Royal Blood's show - Black Honey is currently supporting btw - in front of three hundred or so people way before the release of their first album !). So again, I first found Black Honey quite sweet and to be honest, Izzy does have the knack to catch your eye ! Even if I usually rather go for dirtier loud things, as the show went on, I got caught by this indie rock that British people have so much talent for so that I finally ended up at the merch after the set. The guys were really cool, accessible and easy-chatting and Izzy was even pleased to feel a kind of "home" touch when she noticed my Blood Red Shoes tee, another Brighton band they spent some time with at the studio few weeks before. I walked out the venue quite happy of the shows I'd attended that night (Black Honey, Broken Hands, Vant, Yak, Last Train, The Limiñanas). The following day being even more hectic but this is another garage story ...

A few months later, I got all the more grateful to Black Honey when I came across an interview in which they mentioned an unknown band to me they were touring with at the time : Dream Wife !! Love at first listen ! I immediately had a crush on Rakel's voice and Alice's dissonant sound of guitar. A few weeks later, it even took me to a four and a half hour drive to their only French gig this summer, at "Chauffer Dans La Noirceur Festival". A few parts of the show are included in the "Bonus" section here (with a menu made from two photos taken at the time) even if, as for the "Black Honey" extras, the sound taken by a camera in a hall or under an open-air marquee can't match a soundboard capture. However, instead of keeping the yet too scarce professional Dream Wife livestreams available, I decided to turn to AdmiralNeeda's footage (big up to you, mate !) filmed in Oakland, California, this year as it sounds much more in tune with Dream Wife's pop-punk rawness and is much funnier too (see the mix-up between "Alice" and "Alison" before "Love Without Reason" :-) !)

Dream Wife has only released two EPs and a couple of singles so far but "FUU" is for sure my personal 2017 hit (I missed it out in 2016). Rakel's voice is just amazing on this one, shifting from sugared cheek to unleashed fury ! A voice that tells to "Fuck You Up" and that you definitely want to thank for it !!  

Can't really recall my first encounter with Hands Off Gretel. Some time in early 2017 but I do remember being really caught by the name I still love today. Yet, I was a bit wary about the " fairy-tale-freak show like" appearance of the band I first unfairly considered too sophisticatedly layered to be genuinely authentic and natural. But I kept a photo of Lauren Tate on my hard drive which is, to be honest, the least you can do when you're a man ! If I were eighteen today (ages ago !), Hands Off Gretel would probably be my new all-time favourite band of the week. I forgot the trio for a while and then recently came across this Lauren Tate photo again. I wondered how "bigger" the little band from Sheffield area could have grown, if it has ever, and I was quite amazed by the large amount of fans and materials available on the net on which not much could be grabbed a few months before. I was totally wrong on my first impression. Lauren Tate is a real creative power machine who commands respect and admiration at such an early age. Sticking to the band's DIY ethic, she turned down an X Factor offer to relentlessly dive in a grungy 90s revival in which she holds all the aspects of the band's imagery and sound, from the artwork, drawings, photos, posters, clothes, web design to the song writing and videos (quite a few impressive"behind the scenes" videos are available on the net). In her DIY spirit, Hands Off Gretel is also a family business, Lauren Tate's mum co-managing the band and the booking. Of course, one can't help thinking of Courtney Love's growls and Brody Dale's roars listening to the young screamer. More, she often quotes Kathleen Hanna as one of her personal role models. The reference to the riot grrrls movement is obvious and the name of the band is incidentally no less than a sassy variation of Babes In Toyland's song "Handsome And Gretel". Hands Off Gretel have just released their first thirteen-track album and a second lp comes out in january 2018 ! A sincere start for a promising band no doubt. Well, Linda Perry, Kate Nash and Shirley Manson seem to think so ... :-)

Enjoy !

Cheers !   

Chac