Thirst Club Esquires Bedford. Saturday 2nd April 2005.
Reviews by Whatley, Robby and Keith.
2nd April. The second day of the fourth month of the two thousand and fifth year, AD. The pope died. Life goes on.
Enough of that, Let's get on with the review! After knowing Keith for many many years (About 1 and a half, But eh, who cares!?) it's about time I wrote a review for him.
So the night started like any night at Esquires, Everyone energetic for the first band, be they good or bad - THIS time they were good, THANKFULLY.
Bent like Bob kinda remind me of RATM - They have that energetic rap metal feel to them while still keeping the thrashy style. It was pretty damn good, although to be perfectly honest they gave a better performance last time. I enjoyed it either way.
The next band were 3 P D . I was told by the lead singer outside that they had their first practice JUST before the gig started. If this IS true then they managed to pull it off pretty fucking well. Old mate of mine Chris was on Drums and backing vocals, so
give it up for "Jaffa Juice Boy!". 3DP put a lot of energy into what they were doing, although not my preferred style of music, they sure had my foot tapping when I didn't notice it at some points. Good luck for the future guy's.
The penultimate band were Tinitus . I was VERY confused with who the band members were. I know "The Tinatus Project"
to be a few friends of mine, two of them belonging to the county-famous DELICATE CHILDREN. Oh well, either way - Although the slight disappointment, they gave some fresh metal riffs clashing with a clean beat, the vocals were pretty clean too. It was, in a word - CLEAN! Mmm, Sparckly fresh. You guy's keep up the work too, but if the REAL Tinatus come back you HAVE to change your name :P (I'm kidding).
Blackout ... HOO - FUCKING - BOY. About a year ago, around these Easter Holiday's in fact, I met these boys. I made good friends with Chris and went to their first gig in a Rugby Club near Mark Rudderford school. I liked it, it was good. They did some of my favourite covers.
They have gone a LONG FUCKING WAY from then! This was, for me, The BEST gig they have done so far. They had a damn good turnout, the crowd were rooting for them, long hair swinging, devil horns in the air. The night ended fantastically! It was incredible. Back when I first started going to 'Squires, the likes of Sphere and other such local bands were playing. These guy's are the new generation of our local music scene, I feel they may even go further.
Adam on lead guitar, put together some impressive riffs. Martin on bass with his, what I like to call, "Tappy Tappy". Chris with his heavy vocals and Geoff on drum's. The guy's are a team, and a damn good one at that. Keep going boy's, Me and everyone you know now, and future, will be there for ya all the way!
A quick shout out to Tom who got kicked out for being thrown onto the stage. He got dragged out by bouncers and threatened that they'd hurt him if he didn't "calm down". HE GOT DRAGGED OUT AND WAS CONFUSED AS HELL. Thanks for the help by the way Calvin, HELLOWEEN! \m/! :D.
- Review by Whatley
As BENT LIKE BOB take to the stage whilst turning their amps up to 11. The crowd seem supportive as they shout at the band members with excitement to grab their attention. The first chord is struck and the Esquires come’s alive.
Bent Like Bob immediately gets the mosh pit started and doesn’t stop till the end of their set. I watched the young band easily make a good connection with the crowd and from where I was standing I could also tell that they were having a good time.
Their guitarist although came across a few problems on stage impressed me with extremely tight and epic solos which NO ONE could argue with. The drummer had a constant smile on his face and made some very impressive fills, which were perfect. The bassist (who had a very nice looking bass) seemed to have a great time and played fantastically on a song which I caught the name as “Prologue To Hell”.
Finally the front man who had nice and strong vocals which fitted brilliantly with the songs and seemed to have the audience in the palm of his hands at all times not only that but he used the stage well. All in all I wish that they could have played for longer, they have a nice style, which I liked and is different to a lot of other Bedford bands. And it was finally good to see band members use the ol’ foot on monitor position again. Well done lads.
Reviewed by Robby Miller.
Bent Like Bob – raw rock sounds and what a great front man, I’m not saying, (and lets be honest) that he is that good a singer, but his interaction with the crowd shows confidence and style and also respected the other bands on the bill and for this night being such a good line up and something special to look forward to and just being a part of it is more important than winning.
3 P D - I had actually seen these before at a rock night put on at the Bedford Modern – (rare place to see a gig). They have a VERY recent addition on the front man singer front, who it has to be said put on a fantastic vocal performance, a good range with normal, scream/shout style and growling thrown in, giving the overall sound a new/thrash and in some places almost death metal sound. Didn’t quite go for the new metal pieces but there was plenty of variation to keep the crowd interested (and moshing!). They got a very good crowd response, which I felt was much deserved. I don’t think judges like it when bands do dedications but the singer’s brother from Summerfall got a birthday mention (Happy Birthday Rob).
During the non singing parts it was good to see the front man wriggling about a bit, which showed confidence – perhaps more of this should be kept up. Bloody hell though – you couldn’t knock his singing!
Tinitus is a loud ringing in the ear, that’s what the word means not the band, who are a heavy thrashy band and judging by the expressions on the singers face – hardcore thrown in as well. Their guitarist, who someone pointed out to me looked a bit nethanderal, played really well – sliding his fingers up and down the evolutionary scale of his guitar, while their drummer who I was surprised to find was a good mate who I hadn’t seen for a while and didn’t know he was in the band cascaded all over the drums in a fury of fast heavy drumming. They done such a good version of ’ Enter Sandman’ , a song that a lot of bands seem to want to cover but they gave it such good justice for all of us (see what I did there? – there’s another metallica song in that sentence). When they started the Diamond Head cover ‘Am I Evil?’ (also covered by Metallica) I just had to get closer to see the fingers picking on the mighty guitar riff that is in the middle of this song, which unfortunately they didn’t give so much justice to. Overall though their own songs and for a band that I hadn’t seen before they were exceptionately good.
Large crowds, enthusiastic audience, a gig much looked forward to, Blackout must be playing, free T-shirt on the door for the first few in, excellent guitar work, nifty bit of drumming – how does he find all that energy? skillful bass work, a singer guitarist front man that interacts with the crowd, great covers and origional material, wow a System Of A Down cover. This is turning to a roll call list of achievements – And the winner is Blackout. What a great night, one of my favorites on the competition so far. Even the winning announcement (more heckling please) was entertaining. Not sure how I stand with stage diving? It seems as simple as “Do it and your out!”. They have had nasty accidents there before. I wouldn’t want stage diving all night and don’t particularly like being landed on, although the particular stage diver on this night was a friend of the band, didn’t try grabbing the players or damage their on stage equipment and launched on to waiting eager friends so on this occasion it wasn’t so bad. (not for him though) I got away with it once when invited up by a headlining band as it was my birthday... but that was another night.
Some of this gig looked as if it was being filmed – perhaps another DVD?
Well-done guys and thanks for the T-shirt bass demon.
Review by Keith www.bedfordmwtal.tk