Meet Me At the Gates, Don't Be Late

Crap, it's been a long weekend already. As you can see below, I saw !!! and Thunderbirds Are Now! on Wednesday. Thursday night was part two, electric boogaloo. Went to St. Andrew's with Chris and Jenna to see The Streets. A brief explanation of this group may be necessary. First of all, on album, they are more or less one man: Mike Skinner. Mike's first album, "Original Pirate Material" came out about a year and a half ago. His sound is difficult to describe, it's hip hop and drum and bass and electronic and dramatic all at once. The hip hop element comes through in the vocals and the beats. However, this is not Eminem type shit. The vocals are almost more spoken word with occasional sung choruses (from background singers). The drum and bass thing isn't what you're thinking. This is not played at 300 BPM. I guess when I say drum and bass, I'm thinking of the bass, mainly. The beats themselves are definitely hip hop, but mostly midtempo and all very electronic. The drama is supplied by solid samples of strings. Lots of 'em. This approach to music has been referred to as garage, but once American type garage music (i.e. White Stripes) started getting popular over there in jolly old England, they had to start calling it UK garage just to differentiate. Oh yeah, by the way, The Streets are British. In fact, Mike Skinner 'raps' in a thick accent at times. His lyrics are mostly fairly banal, but he keeps you interested because it seems like he just can't catch a break - especially from women. His lyrics are mostly not the typical braggadocio that you get with American mainstream hip hop. A few songs here and there might be self-serving, but it's not about his skills. So, I wrote about his latest album, "A Grand Don't Come for Free" awhile ago on this site. Remember? If not, I'll help you out a little. The sound is stripped down compared to OPM. On the first album, most of the songs could hold up on their own without the vocals. This one is not quite like that. In fact, most of the songs would be fairly repetitive and boring without the vocals. "A Grand Don't Come for Free" has a story to be told. It's not the most interesting story, but the way Mike tells it, you're right there with him, pattin' his back, sayin' "it's alright, mate." So, the show was interesting. There was a live drummer, who was playing a real drum set, but I think he was using triggers, because what he was playing sounded very electronic. The bass kick drum just didn't ring the way it should. It seems like whoever was running the soundboard wasn't used to it, either at first. There was a live bass player (who played guitar for "Don't You Just Know It") who seemed a bit bored up there. Then there was also a guy playing the sampler, keyboards, and whatnot. Mike was free to wander back and forth onstage with a wireless mic, plus he had a 'hype-man', who was singing backup vocals and shouting things here and there. The show was a little disappointing because the sound wasn't that great most of the time. But, they played almost everything off both albums, so that was good to hear. He was very polite, too. About halfway through the show, he was pouring himself a cup of vodka, and he offered some to the people up front in the crowd, but he actually asked the bouncers if it was okay. He wasn't portraying the London street urchin that the British press wants to make him out to be. Very polite, but low energy. A little boring, in fact.

I hate going to the entrance, just to get bars on my phone