jiltedbarfly

The Windmill is a dive. But it’s my kind of dive. There is no daylight inside. Gig posters line walls which look like they’ve been defaced by a kindergarden group. If it wasn’t for the man behind the bar serving drinks you’d think the place was derelict.

KKKK open the all-dayer. He makes a noise which reminds me of sound a gadget my dad used to have to test whether a current was passing through a circuit. Electric wind swirls carry the sound of cyber bird calls. There is a slow, ebb and flow to the rhythm of the processed noise. It’s almost tidal. The effect is rather soothing, like listening to the ocean.

Next up is Nichols Rose duo. A saxophone and drums improv unit. They play two pieces. I always struggle with music like this. I can‘t really critique it. I don‘t understand music theory. To not address the music on those terms seems disrespectful to the musicians. All I can say is that it‘s fascinating to watch Rose‘s circular breathing as he goes on long extended runs. He coaxes an impressive range of sounds from his saxophone, as does Nichols as he switches between half a different drums sticks.

Cam Deas plays guitar. Superbly well. With the picks on his finger tips he conjures makes Eastern textures from the strings. It’s reminiscent of Gastr Del Sol. Using a slide he rubs the strings to create a low metallic hum as he picks the strings on the neck of the guitar. Then, attacking the guitar more conventionally, he plays a raga and his set is complete.

Outside in the pub’s small garden The A Band have set up for an al-fresco performance. It is an un-amplified set, utilising guitar, xylophones, kazoo, styrophone, and assorted toys. The assorted clatter, plinks, plonks, strums and drones somehow seems to work. Is it a happy accident or do they know what they are doing? The sense of playful fun that cocoons their performance suggests that their inspired set isn‘t the product of hours of diligent rehearsal.

I’m now totally lost regarding the running order. People who were supposed to be performing outside, not take the stage inside. The schedule of stage times is now just another piece of redundant paper stuck to the walls.

Somebody who could be Spoono, Wintermute or Mutant Ape takes the stage to play power electronics. Shouted, distorted vocals, which are pitch shifted to a high-pitch, comedy, helium fuelled, chipmunk style, vocal. A solitary person dances at the front of the audience which slowly drifts away during the set.

I miss half of Motherfucking’s set as I’m sat outside eavesdropping on two Americans engaged in a rapid-fire conversation. One of them expands at length on how the world perceives the persona he presents, before declaring: “I live in a world of sardonic absurdity.” I finally drag myself in for Motherfucking’s set. They are Pascal Nichols, who drummed earlier and is ordinarily one half of Part Wild Horses Mane Both Sides, and a guitarist armed with effects pedals. Their set doesn’t do a lot for me and leaves me feeling cold.

Jazzfinger play as a three piece with the guy from Mutant Ape stepping in on third guitar. Maybe they are usually a three piece, but the last time I saw them they played as a duo. Low bass rumbles which have an odd sense of velocity, yet at the same time it feels as if they’re not actually moving, but rather boring slowly towards the centre of the earth. Jazzfinger all kneel or crouch on the stage. They’re not the youngest bunch. It must play havoc with their knees.

There are still two acts to perform, but it’s been a long day and I have an equally long journey home, so I bail out of the The Windmill.

"Hello friends and the couple of people over there," says Spacenoid's singer. More nervy interaction with the audience and the rest of the band give me impression this is their first gig. Their name suggests stoner rock, but they're more Battles, Don Cabellero-style math-rock. They play as a three-piece, but the guitarist samples himself to add another layer of texture to their sound. Drums are crisp and clear, there's occasional keyboard. They really need to change their name.

Jacob's Stories is one man. He plays keyboards and sings, over programmed beats and choral samples. His voice covers an unusual range for a man. The whole things reminds me of Thom Yorke's Eraser album or some Aphex Twin stuff. Half-way through his set he asks: "Do you mind if I get my drink?" And there's an odd few moments whilst the audience wait in front of an empty stage for Jacob's Stories to return.

Monsters Build Mean Robots are a five piece. Two keyboards, guitar, bass, and a drummer who plays a bit of guitar on song intros. They're similar to Spacenoid, down to including the semi-duff name. They have aspirations for an epic sound. Guitars are synced to create a tidal wave of sound, but when the breakers come crashing down its all rather predictable. It's not bad, it's actually pretty good, but good doesn't get my jaded gig going juices racing anymore. All the band dress in black. One of the band has a red bandana tied round his forearm. Is he wearing it because he's signalling his support of Fascism or is he just wearing it because he thinks it looks cool? Whilst both reasons are distasteful, I'd have marginally more respect for the former over the latter, only because it would mean he believed in something rather than nothing.

I hate bands who fiddle about. All Clorinde's gear is laid out on stage yet they spend an etenity in ineffectual dithering before they finally play a note. What's the point of a sound check if you can't just plug in and play when it gets to showtime?

When they finally overcome whatever imaginary obstacle is in their way, they begin with nursery rhyme chimes. The multi-instrumentalist trio then begin to incorporate the array of guitars, lutes, mandolins, thumb piano's and effect pedals littered about the stage. I don't even know what some of these instruments are. A bizarre square like object which looks like a guitar that's been sawn in half and then glued back together is bowed as a guitar is picked with nimble fingered dexterity abd the drummer lays down heavy brush work. The edges of a xylophone are bowed, bringing in harsh metallic tones. I am reminded of Gastr Del Sol. Sometimes they create murk, other times melody. Tunes, rhythms, tones. I'll conceed that Clorinde were worth the wait.

Maybe their name is a prompt to the audience, but I struggle to recall Remember Remember. I don't know what strange act of memory is at work, but little of their set stays with me. It's not that they were bad, just unmemorable. I know there were seven of them because I wondered that the royalties probably didn't go very far. Their post-Mogwai, post-rock, had a certain dreamy element which perhaps explains my amnesia.

I'd hate to be Tartufi's roadie. Their kit is one of the most complicated assemblages of leads, pedals, keyboards, drums, microphones, keyboards and drums I've ever seen. Their only a duo yet there is enough gear for seven piece. Clatter, banging, percussion looped and interspersed with ultra-tight woodpecker drumming. Chant wailed vocals and Don Cabellero high strung riffing. It's bits of everything rock's ever done with hundreds and thousands sprinkled over it. I don't know how they pull this off live. I imagine it won't be long before they decide to become a studio band.

The trouble with having a bit mileage on the clock is that you start to hear things you've heard before. It's not Trash Kit's fault that they sound like Bow Wow Wow or early 80s pop punk. They carry it off with enough enthusiasm and energy for me to forgive their generic sound. They throw in a few calypso tinged riffs over the simple heavy rhythms and chanted vocals. They close with a cover version of 2 Unlimited's No Limits. They go down a storm, but I can't help but be unmoved. They're hardly changing the world.

What's the big deal about Marnie Stern? I've read a lot about her, but never listened to any of her music. I was expecting serious guitar pyrotechnics. Instead I hear bog standard rock, with a few bits of fret board finger fiddling. How has she earned the rep and profile she has? I can't help but attribute it to her appearance. If she was a bald, ugly, old man would anyone be bothering about her?

What's the reference? Heart of Darkness? Apocalypse Now? It would be cool if they were inspired by Marlon Brando's character and just played recordings of insane mumblings. Instead they are a guitar and drums duo. With Flower/Corsano Duo next up I wonder how many guitar/drums outfits it's healthy to listen to in one evening. Kurtz play arid, dry, metal riffing - like a desiccated ZZ Top - with a rolling drum attack. They take in heavy rock, math rock and metal. The guitar sounds a little flat - it seems to stop them really taking off.

Flower/Corsano Duo are legends in their own small world. They don't disappoint. Michael Flower plays some sort of table-based sitar. He scrabbles and plucks at something with one hand whilst the other press a set of keys which look like they've been stripped off a saxophone. Whatever it is creates great waves of raga drone solos like a firework exploding in slow motion. Throughout the set Flower swings one of his legs around like pendulum.

Corsano plays ceaseless, evolving patterns. His skill is to seamlessly develop additional layers of complexity into the patterns he plays then unravel them with equal ease. He tosses aside his drumsticks at various points, replacing it first with a cotton bud and then a couple of biros or short black sticks. I can see no reason to use them unless it's to just make playing the kit harder. He blows into a melodica. The effort makes the vein going down the centre of his head stand out alarmingly. I worry that it might explode.

The venue fills with smoke. I can barely see the stage. Every breathe tastes of dry ice. Through the audience come six figures in red robes. On their heads are white Amish-like hats which have black cowls hanging down. They look like satanic beekeepers. There's a long low drone. The guitarists stand like sentinels guarding a temple. A six-foot long horn is produced from somewhere and provides further low tones, heralding guitar strikes and ringing bells. After a few minutes a filthy, furry, swamp monster comes crawling out the audience and onto the stage and starts to add indecipherable moans, groans and chants. There's heady psychedelic sloth riffage, analog synth float, and martial beats from the twin drum attack.  All the while the smoke machine operates in overdrive, obscuring the band from view except for flashes of sinister silhouettes as the individual members are highlighted by the flashing lights. They close with a more meditative number before leaving the stage and walking through the audience and leaving the venue.

When did so many people start cycling to gigs? There's nowhere to lock my bike. It doesn't help that there's a big turnout for this gig. I lock it round the corner and hope that I'll find it there later.

Powerdove. One woman, one guitar. Slow motion, gentle, acoustic picking, like she's still trying to work out the song as she's playing it. Her voice is pure, plaintive, but not sad. Shady riverbank. Sun dappled, rippling stream. Beautiful.

Dragging An Ox Through Water play odd, mutant, avant blues. There are effect pedal noise interludes, where blasts of distortion tear through like a sound clash vandal.

Jackie O have floated around my consciousness for years, but somehow I've never got round to them. Until now. Floyd like guitar noodle over heart beat electronic throb. Sketchy drums and jazz inflected notes evolve into country twanged space-rock. Is this improvised? It's not doing a lot for me but the true believers seem to like it. My bike is as I left it.

Everyone is crowded around the stage, but I can't see anyone performing. I move down to the front. Two people are kneeling on the floor. A chain of effects pedals are arranged in a neat semi-circle. There is a keyboard and something that looks like an etch-a-sketch. They are both wearing masks of emotionless, white faces. Cowls of fabric hang down from them over the neck and shoulders, obscuring the identity of the performers.

The blank, frozen, faces on the masks weave about as the crouched members of High Wolf continually tweak the equipment in front of them. Electronic squiggles leak out from the yards of wires and effects pedals. It's as if we are listening to them flit from one pedal to another trying to escape. There is something forlorn and distant about their sound. Like a faraway howl heard in moon lit hills, trees silhouetted against the skyline.

The sound changes to a slow thud, like hearing your own heartbeat deafening in your ears. A small pipe makes a sound like the Islamic call to prayer. The second half of the set has more emphasis on rhythm. Rattling percussive thumps are synced with the pulsing heartbeat. My interest wanes. There is a lot of this stuff around and the form is hard to critique. All I can say is they had something at the start of their set, but it slipped away.

Sun Araw lay down a heavy, murky, dubbed out rhythm. Dub reggae reinterpreted via stoned indie-rock. Two guitars. One repeats a reggae skank whilst the other plays a slow motion solo. There's reggae riffs and keyboard chords and echoed out vocals. It's woozy, permanently out of focus. As if they've stopped trying to play exact music. Perhaps we should stop trying to listen for it. It's like the aural equivalent of magic eye puzzles. You have to let things get blurry. Only then will you actually hear what there.

Pocahaunted play as a five piece, fleshed out by members of Sun Araw. Strong dubbed reggae vibes. The guitarist, who plays with his legs glued together, plays piston-armed skanks. The keyboard is echoed out in triplicate. The singer performs an ersatz shaman's dance throughout. It always looks a little awkward. Pocahaunted are more forceful live than on record. The spectral coalescences of distant wailing, shambling, primitivist camp-fire percussion, loops and wire thin guitar lines is supplanted by bass, groove, funk and propelled by trad drum kit.

And for that something is lost. The wispy beauty of their records, where their best songs are glimpses of their influences obscured by the mist and fog of their production, is tonight absent.

I am a hypocrite. My criticism is unfair. My opinion compromised. I acknowledge this now.

My judgement of Kinit Her should be based on their music and performance. Nothing else should matter. But I am hung-up on their appearance.

One is wearing purple shorts, and another skinny jeans and a fashionista's moustache. It is only really a problem because they are playing black metal.

To me Kinit Her play a middling hybrid of folk, electronics and black metal. The riffing is relentlessly mid-paced, never summoning the screaming, blurry, guitar holocaust of prime black metal. The vocals are almost operatic. Not just in their glass shattering pitch, but also in the theatrical delivery of the singer, who waves his arms around as if he is in a concert hall.

But I can't help fearing that my opinion is polluted.

I grew up on metal, with Mayhem, Beherit and Darkthrone. I know the derision heaped on metallers with long hair and corpse paint. I didn't think that abuse was fair. To just be judged on how you look. But now I find myself making similar judgements about Kinit Her.

On some level it is about authenticity. Extreme metal, in different forms, has crossed over and become popular with fans of non-metal music. Do Kinit Her only exist because black metal is now cool with their friends?

Metal used to lack self confidence. Metal fans were derided and scorned by the public and friends alike. It bred a defensiveness that still lives in my psyche. I need to know if a band are for real.

But as I sit in the audience making sweeping judgements about Kinit Her, I can't ignore my own utterly, fatally, compromised position. Am I very different from anyone in Kinit Her? I started out in metal, but now I'm in all sorts of experimental, esoteric places. No-one is telling me to go back to my Burzum demos.

Maybe underneath this is a deeply repressed feeling of my own moral superiority. I want people to know I was into this stuff before they were. That I own this music, and they're just a guest. I admit this, because I fear it has filtered into my judgements on the band. This is my view. You should decide your own.

I cease my self analysis before Burial Hex begin. Freed from my introspection I am able to enjoy his set on it's merits alone. Over ominous groans, cracks, clicks and creaks tumbles classically inspired piano. Like Chopin gone black metal. There is an eerie, unsettling disparity between this union of elements. As if a virtuoso pianist had been warped into some barren, blackened, alien tundra. Somehow it works.

Saturn Finger are a noise drone duo. They deploy the usual array of effects pedals along with ukelele, and other stuff. I can't remember and I didn't make notes. Long hours at work mean I can barely keep awake through their set. I think I fell asleep for a bit. I hope they thought I was just concentrating on their music. What I remember wasn't that good. There didn't seem any shape to their music, just random stuff.

I cycle home. It barely wakes me up.
 

I have been going to gigs at The Freebutt for half my life and it has never looked so forbidding. It's windows have been boarded up. It looks like it's closed down.

When I first came here the venue was the size of someone's front room. When bands played everyone used the women's toilet because the bands amps and gear had to go in front of the gents. Then, sometime years back - I can't remember - they knocked through into another room and created a bigger space. However, the odd L-shaped space this created wasn't any better. For whilst you could get more people in there, only the same number could still see the stage.

Since then they have redesigned again and put the stage of the apex of the L, but there is a massive pillar in the centre of the room where you'd be most likely to stand. In a few years I imagine they'll try again.

Lamp. Three piece. Two guitars. Drums. No vocals. Their songs follow a similar pattern. Mid-paced amble leading to controlled crescendo. It makes me think of late era Polvo and tonight's headliners. Sometimes they meander rather than amble and go on for a bit too long. They could do with loosening up on the rock-outs.

Jack Allett is half of Towering Breaker. It is hard to announce yourself when you play noise/drone/whatever. There's no drummer to give a few thumps and cue the audience that you're about to start. So a lot of people ignore the start of Allett's set. I'm listening though. I hear what sounds like harshly bowed string instruments and low end drones, hums and pops, which summon memories of listening to Popol Vuh on headphones with my eyes closed. There's a dull bit half-way through, but then some low end throb is introduced and it's as if we're in a submarine with ships passing overhead with only a malfunctioning modem for a crewmate.  

I head to the toilet. I can use the gents now, but the latest renovations means that they can only be reached by heading up a flight of stairs to the upstairs bar. From here you go through the bar and down another flight of stairs down to the toilets. You'd be in trouble if you had urgent business.

Like The Freebutt I'm Being Good are another permanent presence in my life. I saw their fourth or fifth ever gig back in 1993 and I've seen them regularly since then. They are down to a three piece. Andrew now has a beard. They play a set of new songs. At least I don't recognise any. The songs sound like recent IBG output. Clear chime-y riffs and math-y knots of rhythm resolve and tangle themselves. It makes me think of late-era Polvo and, er, Lamp.

A man sits motionless on stage. His head bowed. Regular distorted gong strikes ring out. Periodically the man picks up his guitar and plays. Sometimes it's shimmery sustain, other times low bass notes. Afterwards he lays his guitar down and resumes his wait. The gong changes to a droning hum before I am assaulted by glass shatteringly high guitar. I wish I'd put my ear plugs in earlier.

If Cities Prepare For Attack were a study in minimalism then Shift seem intent on out doing them. Or rather doing even less. The drummer plays the same five, thudding, beats for 20 minutes. The black metal, screamo vocals are mixed down creating texture rather than dominating the music. The bassist repeats the same monolithic riff in slow motion. The vocalist keeps nipping between his mike and an electronic box with lots of green lights on. I can't quite work out if, or what, extra he is contributing.  A wood of autumnal, bare-branched, trees is projected onto the wall behind the band. The disconcerting coalescence of imagery and music suggest an alternative soundtrack to Twin Peaks. They play a second, shorter, track. The drummer actually plays a bit on this song. It's amazing that he can remember what to do after the coma inducing repetition of their first number. 

A pint glass full of joss sticks is placed at the front of the stage. A thick cloud of scented smoke drifts upwards, over and around the audience. It's a heady aphrodisiac for Bong's lava speed riffing. Each one is of seismic weight. Like the shifting of tectonic plates. Bass, guitar and drums are augmented by sitar which they use to conduct cosomonautic, explorations of psychedelic raga drone. They slowly spiral in a decaying orbit into a sun going supernova. Vocals are sporadic, deep, monotone, intonements, like a druid reciting an incantation. The effect is mind dementing. A woman hugs the speaker stacks ignoring the deafening volume before spending the rest of the set dancing suggestively in-front of the speaker stacks. The audience bay for more at the end of the set. An absolutely killer performance.

Fleshpress blur together about five different elements of metal. Black, death, doom, stoner and psych. They remind me a lot of Autopsy circa their Mental Funeral LP where grindcore thrash and chugging doom were stitched together with sickened and twisted guitar solos. Fleshpress pull off this genre twitching feat with skill, never compromising their heaviness or the integrity of the songs.

I am crashing fast. My beer tastes like ash. I am paying for a succession of late nights and early mornings. If I hadn't already bought a ticket I probably wouldn't be here.

Part Wild Horses Mane On Both Sides aren't going to inspire a sudden adrenaline boost in my system, they're more a soothing lullaby. They start quietly with dry taps of the keys on the flute. When it's blown the flute been given an echoed out dub effect. The swirling textures soar, arc and wheel like a flight of birds. With, between, and against this drummer taps, raps and knocks the edges of his kit as if afraid to conventially strike it. He creates an infinite pitter patter of beats as if he isn't allowed to play the same ones twice.

Tony Marsh is a jazz drummer of 30 years standing. I must confess that I had not previously come across him. He plays a solo set. It begins with extended, pulsing, cymbal shimmer, like waves on a shore. Then he moves his attention to the skins. It's elliptical, complex. He shifts from the ever evolving patterns with deceptive simplicity. It's like listening to a double helix. He plays fast with no discernable effort. I marvel at one persons mastery of their instrument.

Before Part Wild Horses Mane On Both Sides return for their second. This time the drummer is hitting his kit with concerted force. He has overcome his early shyness. The flautist responds by playing with a bit more puff. I'm bone tired now and I flicker between wakefullness and sleep.

Gigs at the Corsica Studio are a frills free experience. A concrete box with a stage and a bar that looks like it was knocked together in an afternoon. In it's favour it does have a smoke machine and coloured lights which can lend even the most uninspired band some temporary atmosphere.

Morgen Und Nite are a frills free two piece. Guitar and retro keyboards. Blackened guitar tones growl with the contained power of an idling engine. Sci-fi soundscapes swirl around the raw Earth-style mono-riffery. It's bleak, but oddly relaxing in its uncomplicated relentless exploration of one sound. My attention drifts. More texture in the guitar playing might have helped. Periodically smoke licks over me as the purple stage lights flicker. I long for them to put the the smoke machine into overdrive and fill the space with rippling white clouds. 

I realise that I saw Teeth of the Sea a few weeks back. They have shaved since then. Only one member of the band still has a moustache. They open with the a cover version of a piece of incidental music from the soundtrack to Flash Gordon. Voodoo ritual drumming, 70s kraut synth swooshes and old school guitar pyrotechnics. It's probably the best way to understand their prog-y, kraut-y, instrumental rock. They have a straightforward forumula. Heavy on tribalistic drum thumping and simple riffs. They crank up the tension before hitting a crescendo. They avoid repetition by live sampling a trumpet and creating distorted loops to play over.

The Psychic Paramount. Dry, funk metal style riffing, kinetic beats, and continuous wigged out guitar solos played with exacting precision. It's psychedlic, but precise, technical, there's never any loss of control. The bass is played more like a guitar putting down a ceaseless, shifting riffery over which the guitar plays slow-burn solos. It's math-psych-rock. I notice a couple of Japanese guys. They're wearing skinny jeans and knee length macintoshes. They look like Christopher Lambert in Highlander. When did this become become fashionable?

Slow Listener begins with a warm drone that fills the venue. It feels floaty and relaxing. Squiggles dance about inside the enveloping sound. A higher-pitch drone drifts through, like multiple keys pressed down on a synthesizer as if dawn is breaking in some futuristic electronic age. The warm drone drops out leaving a hovvering keyboard sustain reminiscent of a John Carpenter soundtrack.

The A Band are apparently a longstanding, ever revolving collective, playing improvised, free folkrockdronejazz. Past members or collaborators have included Neil Campbell and Richard Youngs. Maybe they're playing tonight, I don't know. They may be underground rock legends, but I doubt I am alone in not knowing what they look like.

One of their seven strong band stands at the front of the stage. Dressed in a baggy white outfit with long hair and beard he bangs a cooking pot. It's like a druid getting ready to welcome the solstice. Another man runs around the venue inbetween the seated audience striking a bell. A crowd of people suddenly surge onto the stage picking up guitar, double bass, accordian, theremin and sliding behind a drum kit or table of effects pedals. The bassist creates a low drone by rubbing the strings with the bow in small circular movements. Members continually dash on and off stage as the plethora of instruments are used or abused according to the players whims.

A dry riff from the guitar works offs the drummers steady mechanical thud. The rest of the band lock-in on the incessant beat. Horror movie scream yodels wail out of the stew. A man moves about the venue carrying two shells which he claps together in the ear of each member of the audience. That element of the performance becomes unique to each of us. Space noises bubble from the electronics building to a maelstrom of noise. The wailing drops out leaving the drummer to tap out delicate patterns. A member of the audience joins in the performance by repeatedly scrapping his chair across the floor. A Band members dart about the stage theatrically tapping instruments before scampering off to another instrument whilst audience members are encouraged to whirl purple pom-poms around their heads. Bizarre, amazing, and shambolic. The A Band career along the divide between genre defying genius and drunken rabble. Which side of that line they're on is probably always open to interpretation.

Mudboy asks for the lights to be turned off. Those that remain on he covers with rags. He places small ultraviolet lights around the stage and equipment, before wandering amidst the audience with lighted incense chiming a small bell. His set, thus heralded, begins with gentle static like the noise of a distant ocean. He leaves this to loop slowly whilst going off to drag spare chairs about the audience. Returning to the stage he adds nice tone drones from his customised keyboards. He takes a microphone and sings whilst stalking about the audience standing on the chairs he had positioned a few minutes earlier. Bird noises and the rush of a lonely wind creep out of the rich gently pulsating hums. Mudboy again slips into the crowd moving from table to table extinguishing the candles dotted about on them so the venue is in near darkness. He then takes a light and swings it about his head creating a lo-fi strobe. People passing by outside the window stop to look in as they try to figure out what is going on. If they'd asked I am not sure that I could have explained. Sometimes it is enough merely to experience a performance rather than understand it.

I'd come to see xNoBBQx. They'd cancelled earlier in the day so that meant it was straight into Times New Viking. Probably the top exponents of scuzzy guitar rock. Tonight the sound is cleaner. The drummer really thumps his kit. The pop hooks are added by the keyboard player. Childish, catchy tunes with an infant like appeal emphasised by the schoolyard chanting of the dual vocals. They begin to sound a bit one note. On record where there's more scuzz there is more variety, sharper tones from when the needle is buried in the red. Despite having three albums behind them their set barely last half an hour. You probably don't want, or need, any more.

I'd seen Mika Miko awhile back. They've managed to achieve to pick up a lot fans since then without me noticing.They start off in a fairly lacklustre way. The crowd love it, bouncing around and stage diving. After a couple of songs they find some good energy and it becomes less routine. But it really reminds me of L7 and a million punk bands I've heard before. I guess some things never go out of fashion. They play a 30 minute set as well. They're called back and they rattle through a couple of songs. Ever feel like you've been cheated?

There is hardly anyone in Bardens. Big Natural delay their set as long as possible. It looks like the bands will be performing to each other until a surge of late arrivals means there is an approximation of an audience and the band take the stage.

Their set opens with an unlikely cover version, a piece of incidental music from the film Flash Gordon. Can't quite place it in the film, but it's one of the heavy rhythmic pieces. May be from the rite of passage sequence on Prince Barron's homeworld. Bizarrely it works. Synchronised drumming, synthscapes and guitar that sounds like it's echoing out of a canyon. I don't recognise the next track so maybe it's one they've written. There's more of the heavy, martial drumming which slowly builds behind long synth tones and vocals which sound like Mongolian throat yodelling. Given that three of the band have moustaches they are surprisingly good.

Temperatures are rocks component parts. Bass and drums. The bassist is not so much interested in playing his instrument as coaxing the unconventional from it. At times it is like someone directly playing the strings inside a piano. During others there are dry scrapes, creak, scratch and later something that sounds like a mini-pneumatic drill. All the while the drummer maintains an incessant rumble.

Grey Daturas open with 10 minutes of feedback wash. If they play anything that might resemble a tune I consider it an accident or tongue-in-cheek homage to what was known as rock. Eventually one of the band slips behind the drum kit and leathers the kit. The next 30 minutes are ecstatic whiteout riffage. Continually peaking and falling as only the most abrasive guitar string abusal cuts through the molten metal murk. It's like sticking your head out of the window of a speeding car. Your head is buffeted by the wind which drys your eyes out the experience becomes as much about exhiliation as endurance.

I should have expected there would not be a bar. But this is my first time attending a gig in a church. Inside it is low lit. The pews are mostly in darkness and the stage is only illuminated by a couple of red lamps which add a slightly sinister atmosphere.

At first I assume that the man standing to the side of the stage is DJing, but when another man slips behind some effects board on the other side I realise that Dieter Muh are already playing. They create ever evolving soundscapes, manipulating samples and noise. Choral voices swirl out of glitchy static pops, then turn to echoed out gurgle and a thudding bass rumble. Crackles, like arthritic knuckles slowly being flexed. Church bells ring out, I don't know if this is a coincidence or a knowing reference to tonight's venue. It builds towards a consuming suction whoosh like a hoover apocalypse. I can't quite remember how they end. After over an hour of their set my attention had drifted away.

Skullflower begin quietly. A sci-fi violin and cello are slowly, almost imperceptibly, bowed creating a noise like the wailing of cybernetic cats. This remains the bed rock of Skullflower's set for the next 90 minutes. The drummer adds discrete metallic shimmer from cymbal and bells, before introducing muted, ceaseless, shifting drums rolls and fills.

The church begins to fill with the smell of incense which is so strong that it must be coming from a couple of funeral pyres. The noise and tones relentlessly build. The man on the cello switches to bass guitar. Peircing guitar cuts through like someone dragging their finger nails down a blackboard. Occassionally, someone sings, yells, screams, into a microphone. It is impossible to tell what as his back is to the audience and there is only a minute change in the cacophony assailing me.

This is the central contradiction. Despite the incredible volume this is music of small differences, tiny inflections, and shifts in pitch. I stare out the large church windows at the dark blue of the night sky and concentrate on the sound. I look back at the stage and the bassist is kneeling on the steps facing the altar. However, if it is an act of subjugation it is to the array of Marshall amps emitting the howling, audio, pain.

And then it ends. I stumble out the church dazed unable to make sense of an experience that was equally enraptured ectasy and endurance sapping agony.

The streets are empty of people and traffic. Six inches of snow have settled on peoples motivation. The crowd is predictably thin.

If Forest Creature were an animal then they would be a Centaur. An unhappy cut'n'shut creature. One plays distorted keyboard, the other plays processed techno-ish beats, but they don't quite marry. It sounds like the left and right channels coming out your speakers are out of phase. It becomes heavier, a regular thudding roar, like travelling through a tunnel on an unpaved motorway. Then they make it harsh, but it is not harsh enough. Or musical enough.

Minimal set-up for U.S. Girls. Two effects pedals and a brown box that might, or might not, be playing a CD of backing tracks. There is moan, singing, wailing over the hiss fuzz. The better songs are the ones where there is an identifiable guitar sample. There is a demented cover of Kirstie MacColl's Endless Days. Something is missing though from the music. There is no sunny uplift of tunes, nor the visceral excitement of noise, or the ecstatic eureka of unlocking something complex. Instead there is just the lonely absence of understanding. The knowledge that I don't get this.

My attempts to reach this gig are continually thwarted. The underground station is closed. I wait quarter of an hour for a train at one that is open. Roadworks snarl my bus, stranding me in traffic.

When I arrive I am in an intemperate mood and Wooden Spoon are already playing. Gentle, slow, half-tunes, which isn't the criticism it might sound. The two guitarist weave intricate patterns embellished by piano and violin. Their intricate folk reminds me of passages in Peckinpah's westerns when the hoary, old cowboys - oblivious for the moment to their redundancy and impending extinction - sit around laughing and joking.

Chora begin like wind whistling through an empty house. It is a cold, barren. There is rattle and clank from the drummer, abused violin, and misjudged howl from the bowed guitar. It is rock. But rock as scrape, rattle and wail. The improv builds to a tumult. Dry sax runs and Rashid Ali drums. Chora sit hunched over in a small circle. This type of music must be incredibly bad for your posture. Someone bowing either the guitar or violin produces a sound like a small child dying. An altogether unpleasant sound that would not disgrace an Argento film.

When I say Ben Reynolds plays drippy country twanged folk it reflects my tastes rather than his ability. I can find nothing to commend the sub-Dylan vocals and pedestrian guitar. The drummer is very tight though. They ask the audience if they should play one or two more. I am tempted to tell them to stop now.

Church organ drone opens Ashtray Navigations set. Phil Todd plays 70s krautrock solo, spacey and echoed out, then slow-burning fiery raga. A woman manipulates pedals and adds vocals. Blissed out noise and what sounds like an electronic kazoo. The guitar varies between drone and oscillations and solo burn out, aquatic pops and sun bursts of catherine wheel noise. The late hour, drone and 7% beer combine and I'm half asleep which only heightens my enjoyment of the set. They play a second shorter song, heavy keyboard squelch. There is a real deepness to this drone. It drops out and ends.