If I had been at home last September I would have spent a good proportion of my time supping lager and rocking out to the sound of local talent at the Orkney Blues Festival. I’ve always enjoyed live music, especially when the musicians happen to be my contemporaries from school. I’m thinking in particular of the excellent local group called Bad Taste, but there are plenty of others too; like the Condition and Bad Dog, No Biscuit.
Sadly I wasn’t able to attend last year’s festival, as I was committed to work in London. However, that didn’t stop me from going to several excellent live music events in the capital. The first was probably the most spectacular, a concert held in Wembley Stadium in front of over 90,000 people. It was exciting, energetic and very loud; just what I expected from Muse and their excellent support bands; Biffy Clyro, White Lies and I Am Arrows.
I’d never been to Wembley before and although I had been to the Stadium of Light in Sunderland, the sheer size of the place was quite overwhelming. It struck me that the entire structure was designed and built purely as a money making cathedral of fun and entertainment. Unlike some farmland that becomes the site of an outdoor festival for three days a year, or a barn that’s used for a dance now and again, this gigantic concrete and steel oval was built almost exclusively to host football matches and music concerts. It is pretty impressive.
The other two gigs were a much smaller affair held in the rather tired looking Shepherds Bush Empire. The first performance was given by the ex Procul Harum guitarist Robin Trower, with the excellent young axe man, Aynsley Lister as the support act. Our second trip to the same venue was to see the American guitarist, Walter Trout who was touring to promote his new album.
Most of the Empire punters were men in their late fifties and sixties, and several of them had a son with them who was clearly being initiated into the classic rock brethren. After the Trout gig, the sister of one of my dad’s old school friends who had accompanied us commented that, to put it politely, the band members were not exactly oil paintings. I feel that comment was indicative of a wider change in opinion about music entertainment. It appears that the modern tendency is to place as much, if not more emphasis on the looks and ‘sex appeal’ of the band members as on their actual ability to play brilliantly.
Perhaps the influx of television talent shows in recent years has steered us towards an expectation that musical artists and performers should look like a star, as well as play like one. I think this is wrong. I have a theory that maybe some of the less charismatic youngsters, finding it hard to gain popularity amongst their fickle friends, perhaps decided to concentrate their energy on becoming highly skilled at playing their chosen instrument rather than chasing the opposite sex? But that’s just my theory.
This leads me to a second point, which is the contrast between the Muse and Trower/Trout performances. Both of the Empire gigs were very simple affairs. Musicians dressed in jeans with a fairly simple array of sound kit and some coloured lights. Conversely, the Muse concert was an epic display of pyrotechnics, rotating space ship stage platforms, flashing lights, visualisations and dancers.
Don’t get me wrong, they played extremely well and the band’s leader, Matt Bellamy, is widely regarded as one of the best guitarists of my generation. But I do wonder if it’s now considered necessary to include these elements in the concert to retain the attention of some members of my generation, many of who’s attention span has been shrunk by the fleeting nature of the Internet and the constant availability of interactive entertainment.
I’m looking forward to seeing more bands and guitarists playing in London as we go through 2011. But for me there is nothing quite like the sweaty, no frills gigs often played out in the pubs around Orkney. It will also be interesting to see who my generation get excited about going to see when we get a bit older. I wonder if Jedward or Lady Gaga will have quite the same appeal when they reach their sixties?
No comments:
Post a Comment