Art Brut

Dutch insults are darned harsh-sounding. I find this out very quickly. As Art Brut take the stage in fact. As Art Brut slide onstage in front of a huge London Calling banner. As Art Brut slither onstage as part of the two day Paradiso jaunt that reaffirms that there is a slew of talent ready for the slavering maw of fame to devour.

Cause there's something about this wonderful City, this wicked old church, this group, that has a synchronicity that is rare and effervescent. Something that is compelling and crunchy and creative and daft and spiky and all those adjectives that are becoming insipid by overuse.

So I'm lifted off my feet amidst several hundred of the Amsterdamned, those used to the thrilling, gable-topped dark excitement of the City, those for whom music and fashion ARE separable, those for whom a band giving it some is as visceral as it is vulnerable. And it doesn't matter what you look like when you're watching the band. It's only important to be part of it.

Eddie Argos, slightly worse for wear, shouts, screams, jumps, jives, jelly-legged and metal-faced:> _'Bang! Bang! * Rock N Roll!"*_.

Wowsers.

And also.

If I may say so.

Raaaaargh!

Consumed by this serotonin-rock energy, I inadvertently stompdillydallyomp on the foot of the girl beside me. Her monstermunch boyfriend ain't happy. I apologise. A stream of invective, guttural and phlegm-red, roars my way.

Plate-eyed and somewhat scared, I hold my hands up.

The guitars sear and soar and blister. Cochineal-cheeked Lowlanders alternately smile and grimace at the spectacle before them. I shimmy left, right, Bergkamping my way round any space I can possibly find to plant my feet; but there is none. So I stand on someone's foot again, cause *Eddie * has made me laugh and wobble by introducing 'These Animal Menswear' as being about being a bit of a rip-off; and for the first, but not last time, tonight, the gleeful deconstruction of the form rears its winking head above - or below - the raucousness of the delivery.

Because Art Brut are the sort of band who slam together wit and intelligence to a backdrop of pure, dirty-geetared noise-foolery; who can put on the hat of cogency one second, then write 'Tits' _and _'Guns' on their knuckles (as Ian has tonight) and drink themselves into rock n roll Womble-land in the next breath. Because for every column inch they'll generate in the serious media there'll be a fanzine getting off on their fundiddlymental fun and piss-around passion.

Because this is a band who are real people.

And real people acknowledge life, as art, is full of inherent contradictions, and that embracing that concept is the key to a sort of unstated freedom.

A stretch, perhaps: perhaps not.

But any musical group that can provoke analysis and instant physical response at equal turn is bound to attract such faux-modish wordcrunching, and anyway it's irresistible.

Still, whatever way you choose to look at it, tonight's a triumphant performance topped off by Eddie's jumping on the monitors as 400 people roar when he - and the rest of these outriders - slash out the anthemic _ Formed A Band_**. As a gig, as an experience, as a moment, there's something happening here that is making something happen. Bands have formed tonight. New franchises, new feelings maybe. And it's almost - nearly - inspirational. Or maybe just a good laugh. Possibly - probably - both are true.

I am pushed back by the swell of the satiated crowd. I jinkdiddlyoink smackspackbang right onto the girl's foot again.

_Ah.

Fuckididdlyuck._

I'm scared to turn into the inevitable facesmashin' haymaker of the 7ft boyfriend; I feel a hefty hand on my shoulder and I slowly spin round, tense and terrified.

The boyfriend hugs me and the girl smiles. This is Amsterdam, after all. Anywhere that places such an emphasis on multilingualism must inevitably hold communication inviolate. And if there's one thing that tonight rams home, communication is at the crux of Art Brut's ethos.

That insults are ugly, but fundamentally bound by language; and that love, creativity, independence, expression and hope are beyond any cage of words.

And that if you stand on someone's foot, but they're having fun and are happy, that you probably won't cop a slap in the mush.

Image courtesy of Zoe Alex