- Artists:
- JJ72 »
- Xavier Floyd Firebird »
For a band who promised so much with their debut, JJ72 didn’t half fuck it all up with their overblown second album. A sell-out crowd shows that people are willing to forgive this however, and it’s all smiles onstage tonight, save for the face-pulling earnestness of their angst ridden mini-anthems, of course.
There is less smiling from three-piece support Xavier Floyd Firebird however, who through gritted teeth sound like The Cooper Temple Clause with extra bollocks - some claim when you consider the fact that they should, you’d hope, have precisely half the amount of testicles as the Reading six-piece.
It’s impossible not to be taken by tracks with the sheer power of ‘Brazillia’, which contains equal parts heaviness and harmony and is a slab of pulsing brilliance. Equally, ‘Boss Man You Scare Me'_ is a paranoid scream of gigantic rock which is as charged as a Duracell bunny after swallowing a litre of battery acid. ‘California Sunset’ ends their evening and is a fittingly ballsy end to an electric set.
Whether the sun has already set on JJ72’s commercial career is still in the balance, but despite seemingly being destined for cries of JJ seventy-who?, the return of the Irish indie-pixies is made all the more strange as they look approximately eight months younger than when they started out in 2000. However, their sound has definitely come of age and although vocalist Mark Greaney still looks suspiciously like H from Steps, (you never see them in the same room, do you?), his Brian Molko-sucking-on-helium vocals seems less screeching, and more angelic these days.
If tonight proves anything, it’s that the band appeared on the scene too early, as their poetic indulgences were well ahead of Pete Doherty’s odes to Arcadia, the intelligent lyrics easily pre-date Bloc Party and the camp operatics even managed to pip Muse to the post. ‘Snow’ still petulantly recreates teenage angst perfectly, while ‘October Swimmer’ now feels like it is waving rather than drowning in its excessive dramatics.
A flurry of news songs, including new single ‘She’s Gone’, are equal parts tender lullabies and screaming nightmares, which highlight that the band is basically a vessel for Greaney’s amazing vocal range. As fucking annoying to some as he is enchanting to others, there is no doubting that he is a star of sorts. Whether the band can continue to shine or in fact exploded creatively a long ago remains to be seen, but tonight at least shows that a fire is still burning.
- Snowed in? DiS presents its playlist for a day of the white stuff
- JJ72 split; world's turn unaffected by non-existent aftershocks
- “We are to all intents and purposes a new band."
- JJ72 - Coming Home
- JJ72 - Coming Home
- EXCLUSIVE: JJ72 New Single + Video
- JJ72, Xavier Floyd Firebird at The Joiners, Southampton, Wed 08 Jun
- JJ72, Xavier Floyd Firebird at The Joiners, Southampton, Wed 08 Jun
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Reading/Leeds 2008: what the bands thought
JJ72
If they do a full UK tour i'll pay 'em another visit.
JJ72
Re: JJ72
And they've learned their lesson and got another pretty girl into the band.
JJ72
JJ72
Thought XFF were also great as ever, though they did look a bit knackered and sunburnt..............
Re: JJ72
Yep. The songs are better, and it isn't spoiled by the sheer hideousness of Broken Down. For me, the only negative is that Flood didn't quite seem to reign in Mark's voice enough. I know they were trying to go for the raw, emotional feel but songs like Nameless and Formulae would be the better for better vocals.
JJ72
And when i saw them live, years ago, they were not really good.
JJ72
Second album is seriosuly underrated, I reckon.
JJ72
Thought JJ72 and Xavier Floyd Firebird were both quite brilliant. =)

JJ72
Xavier Floyd Firebird
In Photos: Monotonix @ Hector's House, Brighton
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