BEDFORD METAL NIGHT: Delicate Children, Tinitus, Triphazard and Sui Juris.
The Bedford Athletic Rugby Club Wentworth Drive Putnoe Bedford.
Saturday May 28th 2005.



Well after being called in, like the rest of blackout to serve and roady the other guys for the Bedford metal night, it was a relief to see that things came together after a manic start. The crowd wasn't very large but those who couldn't come or didn't really missed out a treat! Also featuring, but not playing, was a fantastic Nigel look alike (where do they get those fantastic hats).

Opening the night for us was SUI-JURI (formally known as pandemonium). To be honest I'd actually heard quite a lot about this band none of it good, but they very much impressed me with their melodic chilled out interpretation. Although they have a good sound, they need to work more on the stage presence. This being the band with the guitarist who bizarrely disappeared under the stage at one point when he got excited. These guys really need to let loose and kick someone in the jawalthough preferably not me.

Next up was a local band from Cambridge TRIP HAZARD. These guys absolutely stormed the stage. To be honest they owned it right from the start (which is usually something which a lot of bands find difficult). They gave an awesome performance really getting the crowd going with some early moshing to the evening. These guys weren't even given a sound check but yet came on and kicked ass! A phenomenal mixture of heavy metal with the occasional flourish of some death metal clearly evident through the playing. A great performance well done guys.

The last band before the main act was TINITUS. This being only their second gig. Having heard these guys play before in the battle of the bands, with their old school thrash metal influenced sound, I was again impressed. The guys didn't seem to think that this was as good as their last performance but I felt they really kept things going. They had a hard job to follow Trip Hazard, but managed to pull it off successfully. These guys performed a great cover of "Am I Evil!"!

The Final band to take the stage was DELICATE CHILDREN. Well I remember the first time I went to see these guys play. They were awesome then, and they're awesome now. There's a real driving power behind this band with it's melodic metal sound which seems to scream don't fuck with me! Although this wasn't they're best performance yet, they got a good crowd reaction (from what was there). We did miss mat's vocal screams, which left some songs feeling as though there was something missing. These guys seem to know what they're doing even when they're pissed out of their brains. A special thanks to these guys as well for letting a very pissed BLACKOUT get up and close the night with inside the man. All in all a good evening.

Chrisy Baby
http://www.blackout.org.uk/


REVIEW 2.

The first Bedfordmetal.co.uk gig started basically from scratch - 'building a stage at the venue', with parts arriving to be assembled before the bands had started arriving for their sound checks, using a spanking new out of the box mixing console complete with smiley face made from the graphic equalizer settings fresh from the factory to look customer friendlyAnd No! that blank piece isn't a place to rest your pint of beer on!! With the stage constructed, a disco for local band C.D.'s (and a lot of System Of A Down) funky disco lights, with lasers, strobe, fluorescents and smoke machine All was ready for the first band.

But was the band ready for the gig? With not much time to get a band practice in for a while and a drummer who had only just escaped work SUI-JURIS formerly Pandemonium, took to the freshly built stage with confidence and played their even freshly drawn up set list. Their sound is quite experimental anyway so not giving them much preparation didn't seem to compromise their style. I love their singer's vocal method, it has a deep resonancy that blends in well with his bass instrument, almost indy or goth like. Their drummer with scary eyes looking as he could win a staring contest with a stuffed owl, always puts in a skilful piece of rhythm.
Their main guitarist authorativley called people to the front adding that they know peoples names and would shame them if they didn't approach closer. He later disappeared under the stage to play guitar from below - always looking for inventive ways to entreatingly divert the onlooker, tweaking foot controls for added distortion, giving it their trade mark avant-garde intelligent rock sound.
They were quite quick to disappear after, leaving only one of their crew to watch the other bands.

The next band were the only band I had not heard of before, and probably the best band of the night, they had recently won a Battle Of The Bands competitions in Kettering TRIPHAZARD with their tight professional sound, almost impossible to categorise their diverse style - which isn't a bad thing, steering towards thrash, new, hardcore and other unable to pigeon hole genres. Their front man, at times holding the mic. quite low down away from his mouth but still bellowing an audible scream, while also at times moving in to a lolloping rave like dance. They seemed to have a few mosh pit engineers adding to the attention in front of the stage while onstage equipment shook violently. Well they certainly had the best ending of the night with a huge pile up of their band members on stage, even their drummer leapt on to the heap. They would have made great headlining act and I would gladly pay the venues electricity bill to put them on again.

TINNITUS with their charismatic lead singer sporting a white top were next. They have only had a few gigs including one of the best line-ups of the recent Bedford Battle Of The Bands gigs, but any lack of gigs since, in no way showed! They seem a hugely organised outfit, displaying their talent and skills. Their singer seems to know exactly how to keep the momentum going. I noticed a bit of a line up change since the last time I saw them, with a new bassist who with great stature fitted in well.
They done the Metallica song from the BOTB gig about a road gritter (joke) - 'Enter Sandman' and just as you thought their set was finishing, the crowd at the front were shouting for more, which resulted in that awesome Diamond Head song 'Am I Evil' - an intricate song that must take take some skill to play.
Certainly a band that should get more gigs in Bedford and a band to look out for - or should I say to my cockney sounding mate on drums - keep yer mincers peeled for them, gor blimey me ol cock sparra. Heh heh sorry dude!, he certainly knows how to throw him self in to giving those drums a good pounding.
The mosh pit livened during this band also, going from a playful slow motion mosh to more frenzied mosh attack.
Cheers for being such a good band on the night.

Bedford faves DELICATE CHILDREN were to close the night, having only ever played one gig out of Bedford, known by most of the people on the scene in town and one of their last gigs before their drummer leaves for a while. I have to say it was quite a good night drum wise on the line up - all being rather good. Their bassist played crossed legged on the floor for a while until his alco intake kicked in and had difficulty in getting up while crashing in a heap during the set. The guitarist has these bursts of quite amazing technical pieces with at times turning his back to apply full concentration to his playing skills, the guitars add a distorted sound, intentional or not adds to the often quite creepy atmospheric edge to most of their songs. They done a few from their demo and what I thought was some new material that I don't seem to recall from before, sounding a bit like a gypsy jig with smoother vocals from their singer who always looks the part on stage.
The guitarist snapped a string at one stage, technical faults and stopping during a performance never a rare thing with this band who would them selves admit wasn't one of their best gigs, not quite gelling together, with there not seeming to be any epic quality to their performance. There weren't any obvious mistakes though and was cool to see this popular band for what could soon be a while.

Anyone who couldn't make it on the night would be disappointed to find out that another popular band BLACKOUT who I must thank for all their hard work and support with setting up the gig, especially Chris for doing such a great job comparing for the evening introducing the bands, gave a surprise guest performance of a song of theirs 'Inside The Man', people saw the members of the band around the place during the night and it just seemed fitting that they should 'Av a go' with what I thought seemed such a fresh performance with only having to do one song, adding a kind of polished end to the night put on to permote the launch of this site under the new .co.uk address.

Well done to everybody involved in putting on the gig and special props to the lovely bar ladies.
Keith www.bedfordmetal.co.uk