Manboob, supported by Fall To The Sky, Cause and Effect and Loveburger.
Saturday 20th March 2004, Bedford Esquires.

LOVEBURGER opened a set of four great bands on one bill that was just advertised in the local as “4 bands for £4.” – (Good job you’ve got Bedford Metal to keep you informed). They seemed to be a lot more heavier than last time I had seen them and were a noticeable improvement , it left me wondering how a band sounding so heavily butch could have a name like ‘Loveburger’, I suppose if they were all fat they could get away with calling themselves ‘I love burgers!’ The three people at the front of the stage were like 3 front showmen in their own right, each sharing the limelight in getting as with the football, a nomination for a ‘Man Of The Match’ award, which I will be deciding at the end of this review. As with the headlining band, the members contain two brothers, they were at either end, - one sporting his hamster nibbled cap and each providing good bass and lead skills along with some backing screaming vocals thrown into the mix, with a great singer in-between, a lot of the time with his eyes screwed tightly shut reminding me of South Parks Eric Cartman.

It was good to see a few members of Summerfall in the audience while the next band CAUSE AND EFFECT were up, risen like a phoenix from the ashes of 2 Ft. Nothing, with a change of drummer who this one it has to be said played really well.
There was a slight re-appearance of Joe from the first band on stage at the beginning who does hair raising tricks with gaff tape, before things started to kick off. This was their first gig under this name, using only one 2Ft. N song, no covers with the rest being their own material. I thought it was a correct line-up of the four bands with Cause and Effect having some good material, which sounded like a forward progression played with their usual entertaining edge. The two lead guitarists share the vocals with Nish being the predominant singer/entertainer who the Bedford crowd always seem to warm to, and as this band doesn’t have any members that are brothers I think I’m gonna adopt Nish as my ‘lil’ bro. They played their new stuff for the first time and have a MP3 up on the web (Here) and a two track C.D. given to interested fans.

FALL TO THE SKY were the band I had mainly come to see. It was their first time they had played Bedford but I had seen them twice before. – Once at the Langford Rockfest and again at a packed out pub ‘The Phoenix’ in Hitchin. They have that certain wow factor that blows you away. Weather it was the aftermath of Battle of the Bands, or the last week before people get paid, the audience was rather low, which was a great shame as this band deserve a huge audience – they put everything in to it and I just wished they had a bigger Bedford crowd to play to. The brother theme runs to this band also where the guitarists are brothers also. As with the next band, they have some really good songs and nominations for man of the match must surely go to their lead singer and their bassist – who fantastically moves arround like someone escaping from a field full of stinging nettles, moving round much more than their all too static lead guitarist (its usually the other way round). As for the lead singer who not being lumbered with an instrument is a ball of fiery energy on stage. There quite a young band but demonstrate quite a professional looking performance, moving so well and confidently on stage, adopting some Mick Jaeger like movements on the way, as with the other times that I have seen them they like to permote their website (see Links page) and it really pleased me that the other bands on the bill liked the band, especially as they were the heaviest on the night, - its good to appreciate different styles in music although I don’t want to sound bias or anything but if you don’t like this band then your stupid!

Well experienced to playing live and no strangers to Bedford, from the higher Escalon’s of local music, MANBOOB put in a top performance in the sadly shortened time that they had.
As with the first, they were another band with two brothers and plenty of nominations here for man of the match. They have some new material added to their already great set of tunes to freshen and justify their tour.
Mostly with live bands – their new stuff never seems as good as the old, and you end up just wanting to hear them do the old stuff that you know, that little rule however doesn’t work with Manboob, because their new stuff is every inch as good. I’d had a preview of the new stuff from the night before at the more packed (but badly organised by ‘Music Zombi’ – which just about describes their bouncers!) at the cool venue Hitchin Football Club.
Their dreadlocked drummer who always escapes bad press on this site is one of the best, at one point deciding he just wanted to stand up, perhaps he just wanted a bit of attention – so the band invited the audience to give him some applause, realizing at one point that the time consuming banter was going on long enough, he quickly tapped his sticks to bring the band in to action with the next song. The sands of time were running low and had to cut their set by one song. They got their classics in ‘Lovesong’, ‘False Start’, ‘Tried To’ and ‘All In A Day’ from their amazing C.D. (see C.D. Reviews) and possibly still available from the band. Also their new stuff ‘10-4 Good Buddy’, ‘Buckers Skank Blues’ and ‘Once Upon A Love’, going down well with the spaced out crowd – cheers to Mullet for the set list and the infectiously cheery and cool Granny T (Grant) for encouraging me to do this review – He’s the Jimmy Hendrix of bass players who at one point had the bass guitar behind his head in true swanky style. Joe on Lead and backing vocs. Put everything into the singing also, with his tight anguished screams and dying fly guitar work on his back on the stage at the end.
When I saw this band yesterday for the first time in a while, I almost forgot they had lost their old singer who was being replaced by one of the Henley bro’s who just seemed so natural and having a great harsh professional sounding voice, just slotted in so well that it didn’t strike me straight away that he was filling in the new main vocalist role. He (Dan) writes a lot of their material and even performs solo acoustic sets at Club 85 and although not remembering all the words to the new songs the day before and having a short music stand with the lyrics on at Esq. he seemed to remember the words better this time despite having to play guitar as well, which gains Dan Henley the award for 'Man Of The Match'. Even the sound and lighting guys got a praise of appreciation on a night with a great local line up.

Keith www.bedfordmetal.tk