Witloof Botanique Club reminds me why I considerably deserted the big concerts venues. A veritable underground club, a brick-walled basement, not very big. Perfect for attending a concert with your friends on a weekday. Even better if it’s a punk music show.
The concert began with The K. (formerly known as The Kerbcrawlers). First time I saw them in December last year, in a rock contest – Belgium Finale Concours Circuit, competition that allows small groups to gain better visibility, since 1997. This year there were six quite good bands, but hip metal music (stoner or death metal hardcore) with one exceptional exception: The K. from Liège.
The K. is playing a punk noise as I have never heard live. It reminded me of The Jesus Lizard and the Melvins, but it’s only a need to fit them somewhere and explain what they sing. In the same manner as the vocal, Sébastien von Landau, reminds me of Cobain. But the word of the day is authenticity. Their concert was proof that only three people on stage (guitar, bass, drums, plus well-mastered classical effects) can deliver music. Their sound is anarchist, nihilist, vulnerable, sensitive, vulgar, frank and complex, revealing painful awareness. Their debut album “My Flesh Reveals Millions of Souls” is due out this month.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4F56eCRHzw]
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDVH3sSTxWU&]
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5RBocO1llc]
The Computers come from Exeter, UK. I still don’t know how they charmed me so fast: was it the unexpected mixture of rock and roll and punk? Their figures of cute boys gone bad, as if they were all taken out from Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange? Blond-haired, dark-haired, red-haired, but all five dressed in white, punk white. Action, energy, rebellion. One minute the vocal is on the stage, the next, on a fans’ shoulders and then gone with the guitar somewhere among the audience, while still singing. Loud.
Very good live and one says they have recorded their latest album live in studio piece by piece, without mixing parts on computer later on, ironically, judging by group name, right? Any youtube I find, it brings not even 20% of what they do in concerts. Which gives me the confidence of saying: The future of music is live.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXosIKNzzUg]
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NErVMzIXpfM]
