BEDFORD METAL BATTLE OF THE BANDS 07

 

The Bedford Athletic Rugby Club (The Ath.) Bedford. Friday 26th October 2007.

The Most, Bridges Burnt, Apex, Showing Tonight, Firetype.

Heat 6. Winner - Firetype. Best New Band Winners - Showing Tonight.

Heat 6



(Poster by Showing Tonight)

A difficult start for THE MOST who had to play to draw the multitudes standing outside to come in and see them. From M.K. and Luton with ages ranging from 20's, 30's and 40's. I thought they had quite a bit of influence from 'The Damned' in their amazing swinging sound, along with some friendlier AC/DC guitar bursts.
They had some effective bass work and some great roaring vocals that got the girl contingency swinging their hips to them. Definitely a good time fun band.

Another new band to The Ath next with BRIDGES BURNT with a good front/showman with faultless confident charm in the delivery, even though sounding out of key in places. There was also a lot of movement from bass, but the guitarist seemed a tad session like and a bit lost on stage. Some noticeably Beatty drums added to the vibe also. O.K. they had indeed attracted a lot of fans for them, but they weren't really moving much, or looking as if they were enjoying the band who were I thought a bit rusty in places, although only 16 and formed this year. The bassist and vocals seemed to be the ones putting on a show, while the rest were relying more on their technical ability. It was good to see they varied their set between slow and gallop strewn songs. All that's needed now, is practice, polish and learn to time their set, they certainly have great potential, especially if the band can maintain the showman quality of their mic. swinging front man.

One year older than the previous band and much more professional looking - The following band with influences from Zeppelin, Police, Nirvana, RATM and Sabbath were next, formed July 2005 playing on the singers roof gaining their name APEX with a singer so good but understates himself while talking to the crowd between songs - an almost trademark of the band now; - "Erm yea OK right, were Apex, erm. yea" I thought his grunge like vocals were really well suited to their Led Zep cover.
I love the way they get straight on with one song after another to get more songs in to their set. Their over all sound has a fantastic range of mellow and relaxing sounds mixed with a thunderous roar of drums, vocs and guitar bursts that connects well and sounds so good when they get in to their stride, making up for the slow plodding parts of their rather static set, saving it for the ending, it would seem for the thrashing round and beating the guitar up at the end. A great band and one I like putting on a lot.

Enter Shikari meets Biffy Clyro with 17 turning 18 year olds And that gives a hint who we had SHOWING TONIGHT next, formed just at the end of last year and determined to go strong especially as the Bedford venues like them. Such a lively band with a crowd pleasing front man almost desperately overdoing putting everything in to it, coming on leaps and bounds 'literally'. Then it suddenly all come to a grinding stop for a broken string on a guitar which was cleverly taped with glow sticks adding visual effect.
Grateful thanks to the sporting Firetype for lending a guitar (drop G) to replace the string bereft instrument
Showing tonight have a classy real mixture of sounds and vocal ranges, there really is something special going on here, people were coming up to me and saying "who are these, they sound good" This style of band easily replacing Summerfall (now Sex Club) as their replacement popular town band.
Not only does their singer/front man/keyboardist have a good range, vocals and sound, he also projects this well and entertainingly also. The whole sound of this band is simply fantastic!
The Ath. This night, was we were told, privileged to be the first to hear a newly written song, performed for the first time.
They were allowed an extra song to compensate for their string break enabling them to give us their first ever written song with high brow lyrics and fast choppy vocals which was quite serendipitous (happy accident) as I loved listening to that last song.

What do you get if you cross Spiderman with a Werewolf? - Well FIRETYPE for a start (see photos) They dress quite showman like and have a well polished sound with some cheeky lil vocal parts in with the vocals from their singer, who performs while his eyes glow like burning coal's and owns a definite personality on stage. The level of crowd interaction with this crowd I've noticed is always high, not just a large crowd that stands there. They have some really good material of theirs to play, while adding some good shared vocal harmonies along with a driving rhythm and some memorable well played guitar bursts.
The last two bands gave us 2 bands with very strong charismatic front man singers to their line-up, with Firetype demonstrating they have some very real talent.

The Most

Bridges Burnt

Apex

Showing Tonight

Firetype


For more photos of this gig see 'Gig photos' button at top.

Keith www.bedfordmetal.co.uk