redcarsgofaster

Ladies and Gentlemen, indulge me in some ball-gazing (That’s of the crystal variety, you smutty-minded degenerates. What would your Mother think if she saw you smirking like that? Smarten up! Get a haircut!). I see, several months and a fair few gigs down the line, six young people onstage, playing like the end of the world can only be staved off for as long as the music continues. I hear a wall of noise slamming into the awed audience so hard that the front row takes a step back, the intensity of it magnified by a band who throw themselves so fully into the sound that watching it is like witnessing a band possessed…

The fact that I’m predicting this means, obviously, that it ain’t quite happening yet. Tonight, redcarsgofaster are uptight, anxious, reserved. They’re five dressed-down blokes and what must be the world’s most reclusive lady-keyboardist, who not only stands so far back that she’s half obscured in shadow but who often disappears from the stage altogether, whilst they simply stand there and let the music do the talking. Which is in many ways fair enough - their wall-of-noise approach, with the guitar melody weaving and soaring just under the surface of the sound, the keyboards picking and counterpointing throughout and the absolutely mighty drums punching through and over the sound is very impressive indeed. There are moments of sheer genius, beautiful stops-and-starts, drum intros which make the whole room shudder and occasions where everything stops, bar a gloriously threatening bass line. They’re also satisfyingly loud, as befits a band with six members. They make very fine noise indeed, yet their stasis onstage means one can’t help thinking that it’d lose nothing on record. Which is hardly the point of a live show, is it?

Over the course of the night the band slowly free up and relax into the sound until by the last song they’ve utterly let loose and are throwing themselves round the stage in a manner which is quite beautiful to see. But why didn’t they play like this from the get-go? Ho hum. Not that they were in anyway bad – I’m very glad I went, and was impressed enough to buy the single. Their fierce, loud, scuzzy, complex electro-grunge-melancholy is in many ways just the ticket. But like I say: give ‘em a couple of months and the confidence to lose themselves in their sound and I reckon we’ll have a something which is not only technically but holistically good. And that, I believe, will make for a damn fine show…