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| Wheatus: Pic by The Sugarmill |
Venue: The Sugarmill
Where: Stoke-on-Trent
It's my first gig to The Sugarmill in
quite a while and to be honest I do miss the place. I've been going since I was
14, and the past six years have been a blast there hosting some brilliant bands.
After I interviewed Brendan of Wheatus, it was a nice feeling to be back
interviewing bands - however, I was hoping this gig wouldn't be the kind of
gig that the audience would only buy tickets just for one song. I saw SoiL at
The Underground and everyone kept shouting "Halo!" to be playing after every song
they did. The bands I went to see are a touring family from Brooklyn in
America, so I was expecting a pretty laid back show. Having a full American
line up was quite exciting to me, as you mainly get line ups like that at
bigger gigs playing at places like the Civic Hall or some shit.
The first band to make an appearance are
called Late Cambrian. They are an alternative band who have clear influences from the likes of UK indie bands like Arctic Monkeys.
They gave a great performance, which wasn't too interactive with the crowd, but
everyone still enjoyed their music. It was happy and bouncing, even if
the backing vocal mics were slightly quiet on a few occasions. The song "Ryan
Gosling" got a few wolf whistles from the ladies in the crowd, and when played
it got a few nodding heads as well. These are a band who will go quite far
depending on the exposure they get. They also sold out all their shirts at the end and were barely holding onto CDs.
Next on the stage is Gabrielle Sherbenz.
She's a member of the backing vocal section of Wheatus, so watching her doing a
solo act was very interesting. It wasn't the pop punk we know and love of
Wheatus, instead it was quite soft with kind of cheesy ballads. Her voice was
great and sounds pure when she starts singing in French. Gabrielle uses the French accent perfectly and makes the soft ballad music fall in to a nice state
of relaxation. However, the crowd seemed to be distant from her music, as there
were conversations everywhere on the floor during her performance. As much as I
did enjoy her music, her interaction with the crowd made her seem quite shy.
She spoke to the audience, but it didn't feel like she was speaking to us as an
audience, but then again, half of the people there were waiting for "Teenage
Dirtbag" to be played later on in the night.
MC Frontalot was on stage next and he gave
the audience a much needed energy boost. He was joined by Miss Eaves who added
some sass to the live set. The music and songs were spot on, the music was
coming from a backing track whilst rapping begun. The crowd engagement wasn't
exactly the best, but everyone still enjoyed MC Frontalot's music. "First World
Problem" sounds even better with Miss Eaves on the vox, with "Spoiler Alert" also
coming onto the setlist. Miss Eaves got to play one of her songs and sounded great, though her microphone wasn't helping with trying to listen to what she
was singing.
And finally, Wheatus take to the stage to
give the crowd what they were waiting for... "Teenage Dirtbag". Of course they
can't just play for one song though, we have classics like "Leroy", "Hey", "Mrs
Brown" and their infamous cover of Erasure's "A Little Respect" to get through
first. Wheatus sounded excellent besides one technical fuck up with Brendan's
guitar amp, which was played through music software on what I assumed was his
laptop. Vocally they were spot on aswell, the high pitched, puberty destroying
voice that everyone knows and loves lights the crowd up to make them feel young
again. The backing vocals were barely heard through half of their set, the
backing vocals were bang on key when you could hear them, but to be honest the
microphones haven't been spot on with sound all night. One highlight of my
evening was the cover of "The Trees" by Rush. That was the best Rush cover I have
ever heard, excellent and completely out of the blue.Whilst the songs were
bashing out, "Lemonade" made an appearance and it was a joy to hear, and then the
night ended with "Teenage Dirtbag", with guest MC'ing from MC Frontalot and Miss
Eaves to make it drag on for a bit before the last part of the song.
There
was plenty of excitement in the audience, even if it was for one song,
everybody still enjoyed their time with Wheatus, and "Only You", their new song,
even got a few nods of appreciation from the crowd. All four acts were superb,
but Wheatus did stand out, as everyone would expect.
~Matthew Clewley
