Black Rebel Motorcycle Club

Emerging through a period of unsettlement, which included broken record contracts, drunken muted drummers at awards ceremonies, and an identity crisis that lead to a largely unnoticed gospel-folk record, is the re-erected carcass of San Francisco’s finest British sounding band, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club.

You probably wouldn’t believe me if I told you that next year is the 10th anniversary of the BRMC (I think it’s still ok to call them that) saga. But it’s true; the group that surfed the crest of the ‘new rock’ revolution (the one NME touted before new rave – remember?) are now on the eve of their tenth birthday. Bloody hell, time travels fast when nobodies listening.



The first real difference of tonight’s performance was the return of the brilliant ‘I’m not sure if I’m supposed to be here but if I look totally uninterested I’ll still be cool’ figure of Nick Jago on drums, making a welcome come-back after his two year sabbatical, and probably wondering what all this acoustic-folk rambling was all about. I’m sure all he ever wanted to do was hit cylindrical membrane coated objects as hard as he possibly could.

The second difference is the band are playing the cramped and intimate setting of Glasgow’s King Tut’s. This has to be something of a step down for a group that has comfortably performed at the much larger Barrowlands and Academy venues, as well as a support slot for The Killer’s at the SECC only a couple of weeks ago. But for eager fans, the opportunity to see BRMC’s bass-tinged garage/punk rock in such a small venue is a rare one.


And those eager fans don’t have to wait long for the classics either, two songs into what would turn out to be a far livelier set than on their previous UK visit, and they’re already bleeding the enthusiasm out of a exuberantly rabid crowd with ‘Spread your love’. The party is short lived though, and it’s all brought to a rather irritating halt before it really gets started, technical problems once again leading the way in perennial gig annoyances. A few seconds later, and without one obviously non-essential A-string, BRMC are picking up where they left off, right in the middle of ‘Spread Your Love’.

What makes the gig even more special tonight is the fact that the venue double booked BRMC with the over enthusiastic and uncontrollable Glasgow-mentalist convention, who on the off chance rather liked BRMC too. Those who had got down the front had obviously been looking forward to this for some time, it wasn’t one of those ‘get the pitcher in, wonder upstairs, and see if you’re drunk enough to think the band are good’ nights.



The new songs are met with predictably subdued appreciation, all except ‘Weapon of Choice’ (not a Fatboy Slim cover – thank god), which kick started an exhausting list of BRMC hits. They kept raising the bar by topping each song in succession, and the crowd were forced to come up with new ways to cheer more emphatically for the opening bars of the next song. Of course, like everything that builds towards the point of climax, there’s always a come down (Can’t believe I just said that), and the ‘Gospel song’ is a rather unnecessary end to what was becoming a surprisingly high-adrenaline set. The encore slows things down even more and solo duties are split between both front men, changing the pace of the gig and giving the crowd a breather, and the chance to realise the stench of B.O is hitting new levels.

The exclusion of ‘We’re all in love’ and ‘Rifles’ leave a few of the crowd miffed, and echoes of ‘I see the rifles coming over the hills’ can be heard among the onlookers, as usual. But ‘Red eyes and tears’ is thrown into the encore mix right when you least expect it, and it does a half hearted job of returning the atmosphere to it’s earlier state.



The gig was always going to be good, as a band of this reputation playing a venue of King Tut’s size is guaranteed to be an all round success. Staggering their adrenaline boosting songs would have done them more favours though, and the gig did suffer from feeling a little too stop-start. Still, the new album looks promising and with a May release date I wouldn’t be surprised to see them at a few UK festivals over the summer.

Set list:

Berlin
Spread your love
Need some air
Sympathetic Noise
Aint no easy way
Howl
Not what you wanted
Weapon of choice
Whatever happened to my rock n'roll (punk song)
Stop
Six barrel shotgun
Love burns
Shuffle your feet
Gospel

Complicated situation
Fault line
Mercy
Red eyes and tears
Heart and soul

FUTURE GIGS

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