Here we are in 2004, and the London live music circuit seems to be in the throes of a much needed shake-up. Flag Promotions, who have been our principal providers of goth/industrial/whatever gigs over the last few years, appear to be pulling their horns in somewhat. Flag’s frequent shows at club venues such as the Underworld and the Garage, which have effectively been the mainstay of the London gig-calendar in recent years, are suddenly conspicuous by their absence - and a new bunch of promoters seem to be coming through, with new ideas, different venues, and a selection of bands which looks beyond Flag’s policy of rounding up the usual suspects for gig after gig.

One of the new breed is the London deathrock ‘n’ roll band Devilish Presley, who, in true ‘grab the controls’ fashion, have launched themselves on an unsuspecting scene as promoters under the name Pity For Monsters.  This is one of their gigs, and tonight Devilish Presley have lined themselves up to play a set, rather incongruously surrounded by a selection of take-no-prisoners industrial-metal acts. Strange bedfellows, perhaps, but there’s a good atmosphere in the venue tonight which hints that the gig is going to work. I should also note in passing that the bar has Shepherd Neame Master Brew on hand pump - yep, this is definitely going to be a good one!

Global Noise Attack are tonight’s opening band, but they’re not exactly new. They’ve been around for a few years now. In fact, I once nearly promoted the band myself, back in 1999 - but the show never happened. I lost frightening sums of money on the infamous gig which Gitane Demone didn’t play, and was therefore forced to cancel many of my subsequent plans. Global Noise Attack were one of several bands who lost out because of that little episode. (As you might imagine, there’s a story behind all this. I’ll tell it, if you like, but be sure to buy me a beer first. I’ll need something to cry into.) Tonight, the band rampage and roar through a set of stripped-down industrio-rock - no fancy stuff, just a drum machine beat and some heavy-duty riffs - while the vocalist spends more time offstage than on. He careers around the crowd, looming over assorted audience members like a grizzly bear who’s just spotted lunch, climbing over the PA stacks, and up-ending himself so we can all admire his arse.  Naturally, everyone in the audience stands calmly by, displaying traditional British stoicism, pretending that nothing unusual is going on.  It’s a bravura performance in terms of sheer spectacle, but after the set it’s the larking about and the crazy off-stage antics that I remember, not the music. That might be something for Global Noise Attack to think about: they need to make the music as attention-grabbing as the singer’s showboating if they’re to move onwards and upwards.

Maxdmyz have also been knocking around the gig circuit for a few years. I remember seeing them a long time ago at the Underworld, where their schlock-metal show incorporated a scantily-clad girl on obviously mimed keyboards - clearly nothing more than an excuse to have a sexxy deth chyk on stage. That’s the essential point about Maxdmyz - they like to do that ol’ shock ‘n’ outrage thing, but what’s outrageous these days? Packing the stage with hawt rawk chyxxx who don’t have any real reason to be there is not, by itself, anything special. Fortunately, tonight, Maxdmyz come before us in revised form: no more gratuitous mime-artists. Their current line-up sees the addition of a female singer, who has great stage presence and all but eclipses the band’s male vocalist with her energetic hollering and stomping. She’s like Johnny Rotten’s crazed little sister as she flounces and rants her way around the band’s heavily rhythmic metal-riffing.  Musically, Maxdmyz are as tight as a duck’s arse, and even though I’m not usually a fan of metal in any of its incarnations, there’s something exhilarating about the way the bassist, guitarist, and drummer hit every riff bang on the nose - they couldn’t lock together any tighter if they were conducted by Sir Simon Rattle. But it’s not all precision riffs and freaky vocals. The show incorporates some, er, ‘performance art’ interludes in which a fearsome cyber-skinhead has piercing needles inserted into his arm by a cheerful young lady who, on close inspection, turns out to be Interlock’s bassist. None the worse for his new perforations, the cyber-skinhead then comes out with an angle grinder and sends showers of sparks flying everywhere while the band rage and rumble around him. All this adds to the spectacle, although in truth none of it is particularly startling or original. Everyone from Leechwoman to the Chaos Engine are doing the angle-grinding thing these days, and Maxdmyz’s piercing routine only looks shocking if you haven’t seen the Genitorturers. In the end, we come back to my original point: you simply *can’t* be outrageous any more, because it’s all been done. Maxdmyz are recycling old ideas here, and it’s all starting to look rather lame. If they can’t come up with anything new (cut the drummer’s head off, maybe?) then I think they’d be better off ditching the wannabe-shock-horror performance routines altogether, and simply let the music do the talking.

Devilish Presley are the jokers in tonight’s pack, in that they’re not by any means a metal band. They do, however, rock most convincingly. That’s quite an achievement when you note that Devilish Presley are a duo: that rumbustious, tub-thumping drum sound which powers their music along is coming out of a small black box. Nevertheless, the band have a gritty, physical presence which grabs the attention of the crowd. Johnny Navarro is a manic, wired madman on the lead vocal mic, throwing shapes and wrenching tortured squeals out of his long-suffering guitar, while over on the stage-right mic Jacqui Vixen gives her bass a good walloping and belts out the backing vocals as if she’s auditioning for the devil himself. This is the factor which makes it all work: the two members of the band hurl themselves into their music without the slightest restraint. It’s a full-on blast from the start of the set to the end, and you just can’t help being swept along by the sheer gung-ho spirit of the performance. The songs are bare-bones rockers, delivered with suitably high levels of bile and wormwood: in short, it all just *works*. Now, I’m not going to give any hostages to fortune here, and predict that Devilish Presley will become the next big thing, but the fact remains that their brand of no-frills, mad-bastard rock ‘n’ roll is a very welcome new development in a scene which, in recent times, has seemed in danger of disappearing up its own arse. If you’re bored with straightforward Gothic Rock outfits who can’t see further than that hackneyed Sisters/Mission/Nephilim thing, if you’re frustrated by bland EBM merchants endlessly recycling a watered down VNV/Covenant/Apop sound - here’s something which, in this context, counts as new and cool. Paradoxically, given that Devilish Presley’s influences are drawn from rock’s classic past, their presence here might just help to push things in a new, and definitely more rockin’, direction.

And finally, here come Interlock, with their own peculiar brand of left-field metal in full effect. Interlock make a heavy, but always controlled, noise, which borrows a few essential moves from mainstream metal, but then puts them all through the patent Interlock blender along with a bewildering array of other influences. The visual side of things is carried by the band’s two vocalists - one male, one female. That’s a fairly standard line-up for metal bands these days, of course - but if you’re under the impression that Interlock do some sort of Lacuna Coil/Evanescence thing, where a sternly dominant male voice alternates with a sweet little choirgirl, allow me to knock that notion aside right away. Hal Sinden and Emmeline May square up to each other like prize fighters, and fire lines of vocal at each other as if they’re fighting a duel. It’s almost worrying to watch them go at each other hammer and tongs: I catch myself wondering if it’s all just part of the show, or if they’re going to carry on like this in the dressing room afterwards. Meanwhile, the rest of the band stand aside from the melee (the bassist, in particular, maintains an air of zen-like calm throughout) and churn out a rhythmic bump ‘n’ grind which manages to be oddly danceable while remaining firmly in the rock zone. It’s not that Interlock are any kind of crossover band: it’s more like they just don’t recognise any musical boundaries. Why, if they feel like doing a cover of Bjork’s ‘Army Of Me’, then, dammit, they’ll do just that. A good old fashioned mosh breaks out among the fans at the front, and the set roars and shudders to a close.

By now the bar has run out of Shepherd Neame Master Brew, which I take as my cue to depart. It’s been a good gig, and all the better for being something different, something away from the usual run of London goth-stuff. If tonight hints at what is to come, 2004 should be an interesting year.

Interlock:  http://www.twisted.org.uk/interlock

Devilish Presley: http://www.devilishpresley.com

Maxdmyz:  http://www.maxdmyz.com

Global Noise Attack:  http://www.g-n-a.co.uk

The Pity For Monsters gig page within the Devilish Presley site. A slightly confusing display of gig-info  (the gigs are not necessarily listed in date order, and full info about bands etc does not necessarily appear alongside every entry), but it’s all here if you work at it:  http://www.devilishpresley.freeserve.co.uk/Html/pity.htm

Pity for beer monsters: 
http://www.shepherd-neame.co.uk/beers/index.php?master_brew

Reviewed by Uncle Nemesis: http://www.nemesis.to

2/10/03