After last Friday’s gig/ catch up with an old friend, here’s another one! This time the band in question are long-standing “live” faves in sleazoid post-punk auteurs and Bowie acolytes the Psychedelic Furs, announcing an Autumn go-around of the UK to follow up their “Forever Now” June Festival performance. So of course, I’m going to have my old mate Doug standing next to me for this one: the man accompanied me for my first ever “live” Furs experience, at Hammersmith Odeon waaay back in July 1984 (gig no. 15!) and 3 of the 9 other occasions since then, so I was happy to make it 5 from 11 with him!
I picked him up about 6 for a swift drive down the M4, unfortunately hitting slow traffic at the end of the M32 and taking over 20 minutes to get to Trenchard from there, so we had to make do with a house right spot about 3 rows back. Already filling up nicely, this one, and notably busier than the Furs here in 2022 (gig 1,220), when the balcony – already fully lined with punters tonight – stayed shut all evening! Maybe tonight’s support, former X-Mal Deutschland vocalist Anja Huwe, had a hand in this; German language Goth/ darkwave innovators X-Mal featured in my early “live” experiences, with gigs in 1983 and 1985 (gigs 8 and 39), and clearly those of others tonight too, given the smattering of X-Mal tees around us. Taking the stage last after her predictably black-clad band had already started up a suitably eerie intro, then kicked into the doomy dissonant build of opener “Boomerang”, it was immediately evident that Anja was in pretty good shape after 40 (!) years; facially older, sure (hey, aren’t we all?), but moving with grace and style, and delivering the song’s descending vocal hook with the atonal yet strident and authoritative tones of old.
I’d been led to expect a roughly half and
half split between Anja’s recent harsh, sandblasted synth-fuelled album “Codes”
and her former charges’ material; however of the 11 tracks in tonight’s excellent
45 minute opening set, we had 8 X-Mal tracks! So her own early double of the
pulsing and militaristic drum-powered “Pariah” and the clattering darkwave and
Killing Joke-esque heavy yet textural guitar of “Rabenschwarz” was followed by
the sinister, foreboding X-Mal debut album oldie “Young Man”, and a thrilling,
resonant post-punk “Polarlicht”. An eerie “Mondlicht” featured Anja going full
on banshee wail on us, over doomy, tumbling drums, and “Incubus Succubus”’
strident, repetitive hook took me right back to those early 80’s Brunel Amphi
nights. However, an unexpected “Qual” topped that, discordant, metronomic and
mesmeric, with a squalling Bob Mould-like white noise middle 8 a feature. Great
stuff, the old girl’s still got it…
Follow that, Furs! By now our front spot was seriously busy, and, after I’d squeezed back after a quick loo run, I felt as squished as that fabled Biffy Clyro post-Covid crush in 2021 (gig 1,197). Also, there were lots of youngish (20-something) girls around us… has Furs vocalist Richard Butler latterly become a Gen Z sex symbol or what?? Anyhoops, the band took the stage nonchalantly at 9.15, the older Butler last, briefly joining his younger sibling and bassist Tim centre stage to greet the adulation, before breaking into the glorious descending hook of opener “Heaven”. The tense drama of “President Gas” followed before an early highlight, a tremendously sweeping and morose “Wrong Train”, with the energetic Butler, already fulsome and expressive of gesture, pleading to the heavens in his elastic-taut, nasal tones. Great start!
Follow that? I’ll bloody well say they
did… The Furs were quite superb tonight, as good as I’ve seen them in years.
The band, tough, together and road-tested, exploited a fine Academy sound balance
and delivered a proper performance, focussing on the music over gimmicks
and chat (Butler only taking the mic to sing and say “thanks” after each number
– no intros as usual!). And the set, happily, veered off the beaten track with
a couple of later, rarely played tracks from their oft-overlooked 6th
album “World Outside” in the smooth powerpop of “In My Head” and the expansive
melancholy of an excellent “Until She Comes”. Before that, the soaring,
yearning hook of “My Time” was an early highlight; the toy Xylophone riff of a
singalong “Love My Way” was particularly popular with the girls behind us (!):
and the bullish, racey “Run And Run”’s outro vocal refrain was simply joyous…
“I’ve been waiting all night for someone like you, but… you’ll have to do…”
indeed!
“Pretty In Pink”, the quintessential 80’s crossover pop song for me, was followed by another oft-ignored classic in the brooding verse and big anthemic hook of “Heartbreak Beat”, to round off a 1 hour 10 set which frankly flew by. Encores of the discordant herky-jerky “It Goes On” and the slow burn intro to the punk rock hellride of “India”, which featured Butler literally shaking his touring guitarist Peter DiStefano during his outro riff, rounded off a quite marvellous set. A list as well (which hasn’t been a given for recent Furs gigs!) then a relatively easy exit saw me bumping into Chloe and James from Wings Of Desire (and ex-In Heaven, of course) plus Chloe’s mum on the walk up the hill to the car park; Chloe’s mum had been at the Furs 1987 Colston Hall gig (my gig 68!). We then bumped into old punk mate Dirk in the car park lift – he’d been to the Stranglers at the rebadged Colston Hall (now Beacon) tonight – before an easier drive home got us back before midnight. As I said, just marvellous stuff from The Furs tonight, continuing to grow old (dis) gracefully, and delivering a brilliant performance for what will likely be one of my favourites of the year. Nicely done guys!
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