I had a nice night in planned doing some coursework until my daughter called. “Do you want to go to a gig tonight? I’ve got a photo and I need someone to review the show”. For those who don’t know, this is a complete role reversal at Moshville Times where it’s usually me organising gig coverage and trying to pair picture takers and writers. Not at all feeling my arm being twisted up my back I agreed. So while other of the Moshville team were over the other side of town listening to Make Them Suffer’s metalcore riffage, we were in for a night of bluegrass. Can’t say we’re stuck in a musical rut here at MT!
G2 is the downstairs part of Glasgow Garage, and the route to it is now gloriously decorated with a mural depicting many of Glasgow’s best music venues. I don’t go to G2 a lot, but it’s a great little venue and it was perfect for tonight more laid back show. The last few bands I seeing there are Exodus, Hatebreed and Esprit D’Air.
Opening tonight was a local-I-think lad, Ferester (real name Spencer O’Grady, who you can tell from that is definitely… Scots/American!). His accent is definitely from “around here” but his music is more from “over there”. Armed with a guitar and a harmonica he threw out some really, really good songs. There are a lot of singer/songwriters on the go at the moment singing this kind of material and some of them are achieving great things (Noah Kahan to name one particular example). Ferester certainly has the potential and the ability.
It’s the kind of music that makes your toe tap while you listen to the insightful lyrics, stripped back and easy to get lost in. There’s a definite country edge to his sound, and it varies from soulful to upbeat.
Ferester is at ease in front of the crowd, giving a couple of short introductions prior to the songs, and coming over as a very pleasant individual. He was obviously grateful that so many people had turned up early, and I think they were as well.
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At bang on 8:15 TopHouse bounded on stage backed by some music that I think came from a movie soundtrack, launching into the first of many songs to be played this evening. As I said, I don’t know the band so I apologise for the lack of accurate setlist information. This isn’t helped by them telling us that they make up their setlist each night about ten minutes before they go on stage so I can’t even use setlist.fm as my source of info!
Within a couple of minutes I knew I was in for a good night. Not only was the music superb (and not too loud, I didn’t even need the usual earplugs), they were funny. Genuinely, belly-achingly funny. The between-song banter, and there was a lot, was hilarious. Those who read our reviews regularly will know that I value a live show that has a bit extra. Take the recent Gama Bomb / Raised By Owls show at Audio. A million miles away in of musical style, but memorable for being more than just a gig. It was funny, and both bands put more effort in than they arguably needed to to ensure the show was value for money, and more than just a bunch of songs.
While TopHouse didn’t splurge on a Mr Blobby costume, probably for the best as all their merch got stuck at customs, they were every bit as entertaining. Obviously trying to play it as straight as possible, with some lines rehearsed and some ad-libbed, it would have worked if they’d not found everything so amusing themselves that they kept ending up in fits of giggles. Each song was introduced in a similar fashion, and this song/chat package resulted in a very full night. I was staggered when I checked the time as they left the stage to find that they’d played for almost an hour and forty-five minutes. The time had jus flown by.
In that time we had maybe a dozen or fourteen songs, all of which were worth listening to. I have checked them out online and I will say that much as their recorded stuff if good, you have to hear it live to get the best out of it. Almost each member is a multi-instrumentalist and said instruments are swapped around between each song. The vocals were superb, and this was especially noticeable during “The Mountain Song” towards the end of the set. Being near the front I could hear two of the band singing to each other even when they weren’t near their microphone, before all four hit their harmonies as the song went up a notch.
Some of the song intros where the names of the songs were revealed were tortuously tenuous, much like asking Evil Scarecrow where the name of the band came from and getting an obviously improvised made up answer each time. The impromptu cover of Eminem’s “Lose Yourself” had its punchline stolen as TopHouse did the easy intro and then stopped to ask “Doesn’t anyone know the lyrics?” because they didn’t.
Only someone in the audience did. A Canadian lady next to us rattled off the entire first verse and chorus while the band played on, obviously not having expected this at all. And I think this pretty much summed up the evening. I didn’t know what to expect, it was all crazy, it was funny as all hell, and I cannot ever enjoying a gig more.
From what I could gather, this was the third of three shows that TopHouse have played in the UK and I really hope that it’s whetted their appetite for more. Gents (and I include Ferester in this), thank you. Please hurry back!
Photos by Ellissa Avart
