Strangeforms: website
By: Dan Salter
Photos: Hannah & Dan | Videos: The Fudlip
Well, that was another wonderful weekend. Now in its second year, Strangeforms has confirmed its place as a ‘must attend’ event in the Tangential* music calendar. If ArcTangent feels like a gathering of the clans for this rapidly coalescing community then Strangeforms is surely the premier precursor event now; the go to place to spot the next crop of rising talent (and a few old warhorses, of course). Don’t be surprised to see many of this year’s Strangeforms participants appearing at future ArcTangents.
It really does have the feeling of some sort of extended family celebration, coming early enough in festival season for it to be the first time everyone had seen each other en mass since the dying days of last summer. Notably absent this year were Dan ‘Cleft’ Beesley and Stephen ‘Wrongpop’ Clarke, and the outpouring of love and support for both of them from everyone throughout the weekend was something to behold. All of this, along with the seamless stage management, superb sound engineering and utterly wonderful Wharf Chambers and its staff, engendered a fantastic atmosphere of celebration and appreciation.
To take sixteen bands representing the entire tangential spectrum, from the noisiest noise rock to the postiest post rock, and get it to hang together as something cohesive is a rare talent but something Stewart and Kerry (the brains behind the whole thing) appear to have in spades. Both years now they’ve managed to present an incredibly diverse line up without a single band sounding out of place and that is really not easy.
Right from the off the gauntlet was laid down by a stunning performance from Lenin, a new band to me personally. A beguiling blend of elements of Bird, Marriages and Siouxsie And The Banshees mixed in to something distinctly their own they played a blinder, much to the appreciation of the very healthy, early crowd, and challenged every other band to ensure they brought their A game. They had.
Late substitutes, and the only other band on the line up that I wasn’t previously aware of, Duke Mercury also impressed with a frenetic set of bluesy math rock, imagine Cleft meets Two Gallants, that probably sounds like it shouldn’t work on paper but was fiercely exciting live.
From there we were in to the post rock filling of Saturday’s musical sandwich, with Civil Protection, Rumour Cubes and Envoys all pulling out stonking sets of shimmering crescendos and meaty riffs, providing beautiful counterpoint to the more offbeat riffs and on (and off) stage antics of Falls, the downright groovy weirdness of Alright The Captain and the day’s headliners &U&I bringing things to a suitably noisy end.
The second day of a festival is always a challenge. The crippling hangover tends to make further music more difficult to consume and whilst our state of mind was somewhat better than at the same point the previous year, it was still way too delicate for dealing with Kusanagi, who were obviously brilliant but far to boisterous for us at that stage and wee had to beat a hasty retreat back out in to the Spring sunshine until we’d got ourselves together a bit more.
Fortunately, the musical equivalent of being wrapped in cotton wool and gently being told everything is going to be ok was up next in the form of Tomorrow We Sail. Last year we didn’t know anything about TWS and they absolutely blew us away. Since then their wonderful album For Those Who Caught The Sun In Flight has been on heavy rotation at E&D Towers but that doesn’t mean their performance was any less breathtaking. They crammed a whole three songs in to their half an hour set (bloody post rock) and it was no where near enough!
From that point on it was back on the slippery slope all the way to the end. And what an end. Two of the last four bands stood out as being distinctly different to everything else on offer over the weekend sonically. Both Worriesaboutsatan and Trojan Horse represented if not a risk, certainly a gamble, in terms of the muscal continuity but both pulled off their sets with considerable aplomb.
Worriedaboutsatan’s brand of deep techno, with just enough post rock stylings to keep the more skeptical in the crowd onside, worked as a beautiful conterpoint, and something of a pallet cleanser, to all of the crushing guitar riffs that had been flying about up until that point.
Trojan Horse, on the other hand, were pure rock and roll. I’ve been following T’Horse closely over the last 5 years and watching them bloom in to the magnificent rock beast that they have become has been beautiful to see and they produced a performance that was equal parts exhilaration and discomfort. There were certainly members of the audience considering whether they ought to intervene during the band’s onstage ‘breakdown”‘ at the end of their set; after all, it’s not every day you see a man pull his underpants UP over his head and not fear for his wellbeing. The boys from Salford certainly know how to ensure that the crowd goes away talking bout them.
After that it was hard to see how anything was going to come close in terms of intensity and spectacle but then that was reckoning without Her Name Is Calla. Again, Calla are a band we’ve loved for well over half a decade but with almost constant lineup changes over the last few years we quietly wondered whether their live performance would ever quite get back to the level they were at when we first saw them emotionally destroy a room full of people in Bristol. This performance put all of those fears to rest firmly and I hope forever. The ‘closing’ rendition of New England was as intense and absorbing a musical performance ever perhaps I have ever witnessed; proper hairs on the back of the new stuff. They followed this by getting off stage and Tom, Sophie and Adam moving out in to the crowd to play Burial and Aposiopesis unamplified in the middle of the room, and ending of spine chilling beauty and an absolutely fitting conclusion to two days of wonderous music.
Then suddenly it was all over and all that remained was to say our fond goodbyes to the family and head back to the hotel happy and content. Great people in a fantastic place and extraordinary music. I don’t really look for much more than that in life.
*Saying Post Rock / Math Rock / Noise Rock every time is getting tedious, so this is my new term for it.
