The Sisters eclipse even Joy Division as The Blogging Goth’s primary muse. This is a proclamation in favour of their most standout EP, the legendary Reptile House.
For me, the Sisters of Mercy are one of THE goth bands, and it makes me chuckle inwardly when Eldritch, and Pete Murphy, try and distance themselves from a sound and an image they went to painstaking lengths to define and craft.
The Reptile House EP is a moody slab of uber-goth and is probably the crystallisation of Eldritch’s vision (the EP is allegedly pretty much an Eldritch solo work) and, being pre-Hussey, has no light side… in fact there is no glimmer of light in any of the 25 minutes – and it’s the better for it.
These two lines from “The Bell” sum up in appropriately blunt style the entire sound of London dark indie rockers Cold In Berlin. Their new album is released tomorrow, and they’ll be performing the launch party tonight – so now you can read all about this latest crushing installment in the bleak trilogy of their releases.
Maximum distortion, feedback and volume. It’s filthy fifties rockabilly and it’s drawing a major crowd at what is nominally a ‘Goth’ weekend. But it’s a loose and lazy term invented by confused journalists long ago, and Whitby crowds are pretty accommodating of anything that’s raucous and rocking.
These guys deliver in spades. Puss Johnson’s voice vibrates with overwhelming echo, as she snarls songs of love and living hard and fast. It’s an irresistible beat that has people nodding, bobbing and foot tapping all over the room.
BE AFRAID reads her shirt, and you don’t want to argue as she stomps across the stage, challenging hundreds of people in the audience to a fight simultaneously. Each song arrives like a leopard skin brick through your window, finishing like a punch to the jaw.
All except their final song, a chaotically indulgent number that runs on a breakneck drumbeat, cascading chords and a hymn of shrieking that the singer delivers at one point from the middle of the audience, before collapsing in a drawn out collision of exhausted musicians and punished instruments. Immensely satisfying.
DOCTOR AND THE MEDICS
Led by a crap Cyberman who beats up an inflatable Dalek with a feather duster, come the invading forces of the legendary Doctor and the Medics!
They kick off with an anarchic and enjoyable cover of Dead or Alive’s “Spin Me Round”, dosed with speed and heavy metal riffs. Then it’s on to another classic 80s anthem, “Tainted Love”, before being followed up with one of their own songs – “Not that you’d fucking know it” quips the Doctor. He peppers their appearance with sly, self-deprecating humor that is hilarious and refreshing.
At the heart of the band are the eponymous Doctor and his glamorous assistant Melissa. Where he is manic madness, staggering about the stage, Melissa is taut and sublime, a fantastic contrast. The rest of the band are dressed like someone made an eighties parody movie with access to a Halloween store – but they rock with sheer unbridled enthusiasm that is both corny and utterly authentic.
” I do it ‘cos it makes my hair grow! ” the charismatic Doctor hollers, performing at his best. He recalls past appearances at Whitby, with Goths complaining about one-hit wonders playing – and then complaining about everyone having such fun to them!
“The Old Molecatchers Boot” comes out from retirement after almost twenty years and it is fresh, alive and kicking – and the Doctor dedicates it to The Damned, who took them on tour with them for free. My notes start running out at this point because I’m too busy laughing, drinking and enjoying myself!
There’s a cover of The Cult’s “Sanctuary”. My notes read “The Doctor’s voice is a bloody force of nature”. One guitarist has just lifted another’s kilt with his instrument. Ahem!” Yeah, it was that kind of show.
Next, all I’ve written is “Spirit in the Sky”, “crowd ecstatic” and “Ace of Spades”.
WILLIAM CONTROL
“Jesus Christ is not in the building – but William Control is”
A return performance by that firm fan favourite, William Control. It’s polished electro rock with a jagged sneer by this smartly attired American alternative elite.
William Control on now #wgw industrial with futurepop elements, reminiscent of Aesthetic Perfection pic.twitter.com/FO8NUdVD1R
The speakers are rattling my teeth in a way that even the bombastic Doctor and the Medics couldn’t. It’s raw power but Control wields it like a scalpel – “Scream for me! Make some fucking noise!” The crowd is only to happy to oblige. It reminds me of the Chameleons fans, a dedicated hard core that lives and breathes this performance, a generation that might otherwise have no connection with WGW – but Michelle, whose tweets I’ve been stealing frequently, argues firmly against that.
When William Control 1st played #wgw some said he was only here to draw a young audience. Now he’s won over everyone! pic.twitter.com/cAxfK3XyTQ — Michelle D’israeli (@MDisraeli) April 26, 2015
Control helms songs that draw on core and familiar electro concepts of hurt and betrayal, but he weaves a hypnotic tune that can’t help but draw you in. He’s over the moon he met Vanian, and acknowledging such an influence is no bad thing.
His lyrics also gleefully indulge sex and BDSM, calling out to “all the submissives in the house”, a whole new angle for the music of WGW! It’s going down a storm with the screaming front-row who sing along to every song and cheer wildly for their strutting, siren-like singer-superstar.
It is a rapid departure from the campy, anarchic attitude of Doctor and the Medics, but the crowd size stays the same and the people are just as active in their appreciation. Some of his songs definitely tingle my underused industrial appreciation nerves – it’s highly probable that all the bluster and ego that rankles old veterans is actually obscuring a damn fine musician. Recommended.
THE DAMNED
Darkness, and swirling smoke. A top hatted figure is the first thing to emerge from the dry ice – it’s Dave Vanian, pronouncing ponderously over a lone piano piece. It’s appropriately morbid for Whitby Goth Weekend and nobody could ever accuse the Damned front-man of being anything less than appropriately fashionable.
Then, we cheer, and the guitars are unleashed. The top hat is lost and forgotten, and the boys launch triumphantly into their first number.
They’ve headlined the whole weekend frankly. I have never seen the crowd so happy and adoring. The Captain solos frequently and we are rapt, except those who are bouncing like crazy. My friend, a first-timer to WGW who hadn’t even heard of The Damned before, announces that Sensible is one of the best guitarists she’s ever seen.
They deliver “Plan 9”, and Vanian is strutting and preening like a textbook black hat villain. He bites into the lyrics like a hungry man at a banquet and the years of passage melt away. It’s pure classic Damned, backed by a thundering storm of sound that effortlessly sweeps us away.
There’s an astonishing intimacy as well, such as when Sensible is playing a solo – you feel like you’re the only one in the room. Then, when the classics come crashing out, we’re part of an entire packed room celebrating!
“Eloise” arises casually in the middle of their set, and it is cheered just as much as any other song, and no more than any other either. Despite it being the sole appearance of The Damned on many alternative compilations, the crowd here aren’t for one-hit wonders (shades of Doctor & The Medics!) and it is merely one of a cavalcade of songs that we appreciate.
We’re three feet under the floor again, and it’s timeless and perfect. Occasionally I struggle to make out the vocals, and I wish the engineers could sort it out and give them the vocal range they need – Vanian doesn’t unleash his voice like a weapon, it’s quiet and controlled and richer for the lack of strain, but the engineers need to give him the presence.
The Damned: Very polished AOR Goth with dark hearted lyrics & the absolute best guitar solos this #wgw festival! pic.twitter.com/LqfyZbTi2M
At one point, Sensible has his guitar back over his head, shredding like a champion, and the crowd is a huge surging mass of people centered around a manic pit. Again, my notes are getting incoherent. I’m not a massive Damned fan, so I’ve jotted down ‘ask the Doctor about the songs’ – not from the Medics, my lovely friend Claire the academic Doctor!
According to her we heard a lot from Phantasmagoria, plus some early classics like Neat Neat Neat and New Rose. There’s the briefest of gaps before the encore, which is the most generous I’ve heard a band provide yet – probably thanks to the audience roaring like a riot, over which is clearly heard the chant “SENSIBLE’S A WANKER!”. The Damned clearly know they’re basically carrying the biggest weight of expectation for the weekend (except maybe Manuskript!) and seem determined to deliver each and every demand the insatiable crowd makes.
Their conversation is classic Damned banter, Vanian’s suave and mocking humour versus Sensible’s rambling insanity – there’s cheerful traded insults, bizarre details about Monty Oxymoron’s injuries acquired on tour, it all feels like a casual rehearsal until they start playing again. They simply blow the room away with classic closer “Smash It Up” and I have some trouble recalling anything else, after four full nights of watching bands and drinking intensely.
We’ve ended on a high though, and the bands tonight were a perfectly laid-out ladder of escalation, if a little jarring with William Control’s industrial-rock sandwiched between Doctor and the Medics and The Damned. It’s been more than worthy of the 21st Birthday celebrations, but I am looking forward to just two nights of bands in October!
You can go back and read my reviews from Thursday, Friday or Saturday now – and I’m considering a general roundup of Whitby addressing the festival as a whole beyond the bands. Watch this space!
Sunlight slants through the haze in the Spa,and it’s more impressive than any laser beam. It’s also a powerfully natural sight that befits this ethereal artist. “I see red” intones the horned performer from New Zealand, one woman with a guitar at the eye of an emotional hurricane of sound.
She speaks softly between tracks, friendly and softly amazed at the passion of fans who have headed down early to enjoy her unique style. Yet her lyrics channel a powerful rage that seems inspired by PJ Harvey or Patti Smith – “Pitiful man” she spits vehemently, a verbal dagger between the ribs.
She uses loop boxes, many of them, to sample and replay a single sound or a few bars of music, stretch them out into a clockwork melodic that nevertheless beats like a living heart, all love and hate in every ticking thump.
People might hear ‘folk’ and form an immediate, often negative opinion. This artist blows those conventions wide open, with songs like ‘Factory Nation’ that explode into the consciousness like a lightning bolt – and also sees familiar fans reaching for their ears in time!
Every time the audience applauds and cheers, it bubbles along so naturally, not polite acknowledgement but real passionate enthusiasm! We also indulge in wishing another happy birthday at the top of our bellowed voices, this time to Jordan herself who is spending her special day with a room full of drinking Goths.
They’re baying for an encore, and I don’t think I’ve ever heard that for an opening act – a real, palpable interest that unfortunately cannot be satisfied as the rest of the bands must proceed!
MANUSKRIPT
It’s a sinful start for these irrepressible Whitby veterans who were voted the most anticipated band of the Weekend! Over footage of Blackadder behaving badly the boys thrash out a classic cover of the Pet Shop Boy’s “It’s a Sin”! The audience are bouncing crazy by the end, and it’s a fantastic atmosphere – they’re living up to expectations, and more!
Then the bastards decide to start showing clips from Carry on Screaming as they thrash out their slower and darker stuff! Still, it’s bizarrely cheerful, even madcap, helpers parade through with huge banners, and the audience is pogoing like crazy!
Settling down again, Protect and Survive is an especially impressive tour de force, injecting cold war paranoia into a dancefloor filling classic Goth track. Interesting trivia fact – The Blogging Goth himself has a cameo in the video to this track, made many years ago. See if you can spot him!
There’s clips of James Bond and Spy vs. Spy running behind them as well, it’s a hilarious pop culture mishmash. The boys are chasing each other about, yelling lyrics into each other’s faces – I’ve seen bands be consummate professionals but never seen one have so much fun!
“Chase” from their first EP is a surprising slow track, yet pounding and tinged with patient danger. It’s immediate how popular they were when they started with menacing numbers like this. Operatic, gloating, and very enjoyable. Manuskript made a promise to their fans, and they delivered in fantastic, unique, style!
“I can’t believe it’s not Goth!” proclaims Mike Manuskript, and it’s a pie in the face to any po-faced Sisters clones for sure.
CHAMELEONS VOX
A welcome appearance from these fine indie maestros. They blasted their set wide open with “Swamp Thing.” There are no bad Chameleons songs, but they’ve started with a firm fan classic. Then Burgess, a Mancunian of few words, dedicates a song to Sophie Lancaster and simply launches into the stark and upsetting “A Person Isn’t Safe Anywhere”. Simply powerful.
They effortlessly weave songs of breathtaking depth, complexity and emotion. The Chameleons stand tall as a band of unparalleled creativity and we are supremely lucky to have them still performing with Burgess, delivering a sound that is utterly unchanged decades after being recorded, and yet sparkles with invention every time we hear it.
“Is there anyone there?” he asks during “Monkeyland”, and it’s more than rhetorical – beyond the hardcore fans (like your author) the crowd is quiet and contemplative. The band have always enjoyed a small but passionate chapter amongst Goths – and they’re all here, but admittedly it is a drop in the ocean of the supremely busy WGW.
It’s here and now politics, “when you go for drink someone’s pissing in the water”, and if you have our government you know this too well.”Piss in my water and I’ll knock you out!” remarks Burgess. You don’t want to argue with him, believe me.
The anthem that is Soul in Isolation arises, and Burgess ad libs mid song, ” I’ve left everywhere I live.” It always feels like he’s improvising on the fly, like every performance is something new and unique, and for us dedicated few each gig is a damn present to be treasured.
They could play all night, I’m whirling in the pit with the hardest fans, howling along to the music as Mark Burgess pours out his heart from a taciturn soul. This for me is probably a very selfish high point of the entire weekend – I loved it, but very much in isolation.
ANDI SEX GANG
He stalks the stage, Count Orlok in stark makeup, black slashes on his skin that turn color under the lights. Andi Sex Gang has arrived in Whitby from Neo-Transylvania during the nuclear apocalypse, and he has something horrific to poison your ears and soul with!
The bare minimum of musicians are backing up the diminutive death rocker, and he shrieks something that sounds like the end of days, then casually wishes Whitby a happy birthday. A split personality is behind the mike and none of us are safe!
He howls out a classic track, “Sebastienne” according to my blurry notes, and suddenly the Batcave is alive before my eyes – or do I mean scrabbling out of its shallow grave, rotten and undead?
It’s a beautiful cacophony of feedback and shrieks and Andi shepherds it like the most fucked up conductor this orchestra has ever seen. Forget ghost stories, Andi is screaming something very real right into our faces!
How does the new stuff feel? Like a very appropriate and utterly haphazard evolution of that entire horror punk sound – chaotic, yet laced with some twisted sense of order that maybe only Lovecraft could comprehend. I honestly feel Sex Gang fans will lap this up, but anyone else – like the baffled audience still clustered about the stage – might find it a tough mouthful of bloody broken glass to swallow.
There’s an intermission, a tiny cluster of the faithful remain by the stage whilst piano recordings wash over them, and then Andi Sex Gang comes back with a pig head mask on. I’ve tried delivering that line any other way and I can’t.
Tonight I’m just reporting what I’m experiencing and letting you process that information, Gonzo style. I’ve been drinking pints of cheap red wine from the VIP area and I think it’s actually bringing me closer to the Andi Sex Gang experience.
He drags out classic tracks, tortures them mercilessly and meticulously and the gnarled old punks with proud hawks thrash and stomp and cheer appreciatively. It’s a private members club for Batcavers and if you weren’t there, if you didn’t do it and don’t know it, then fuck you.
So here ends Saturday Satisfaction. What conclusions can we draw? Well, I shouldn’t drink that much red wine. My last memory is of furiously dancing to swing music that DJ Martin Oldgoth has no guilt over playing at a room full of sozzled Goths.
Considering the music, it’s quite conflicting actually. Nobody can dispute Jordan Reyne had three or four times the audience that Andi had by the end. I also can’t dispute the fact that only a tiny core went mad for The Chameleons. Could the line-up order have been altered, perhaps moving the well-received opening acts higher up the bill?
Prestige here must count for more, and Andi Sex Gang’s lineage alone will permit headline opportunities. My words are probably heresy to established diehard Sex Gang Children fans – but this writer can only render opinion, and he invites you to disagree with him!
Coming soon – Sunday Sacrilege, aka Band Day Three! You can also read Friday Frolics again for my Birthday Massacre review.
For me, the Sisters of Mercy are one of THE goth bands, and it makes me chuckle inwardly when Eldritch, and Pete Murphy, try and distance themselves from a sound and an image they went to painstaking lengths to define and craft.
The Blogging Goth 