It’s that time of the month. First Monday.
Bleeding Hearts Club featured in this blog not so long ago, but seeing as it’s a regular monthly event upstairs at the Price Albert in Trafalgar Street, and inevitably excellent, it is not that surprising that it features again.
This month we had four acts, each playing about four songs each and some excellent sounds from the house DJ in-between.
First up was the bizarre yet memorable King of Cats, a man in shorts who went from quiet twee to slash-and-burn hardcore within a verse of a song. He also did something very strange with a second microphone which gave him the ability to detour into these strange sonic interludes which made him sound a bit lie, er… well, a king of cats. He also had some CDs for sale, in home-made sleeves shaped like underpants with a picture of female genitalia on the front.
It was never going to be a normal night.
Next up was Al Chamberlain, apparently playing only his second ever gig. A little shy and self-depreciating he played a series of charming songs telling stories of love and adolescent innocence which completely charmed the audience.
He was followed by Lux Harmonium, a sometimes two piece with – you guessed it – a Harmonium, but also some of the most exquisite guitar-playing by Devonian Luke Jones which just got better and better as their set progressed. Fortunately, the night’s host Chris Davies called Luke back for a fourth song which was absolutely outstanding. Worth the pittance of an entry fee alone. Wish I’d remembered what it was called, but you can buy a CD and no doubt it’s on it.
Finally, headliners Fire Eyes played – drum machine, guitar and violin fronted by some quirky vocals. Apparently slightly under-rehearsed they strung together an assortment of sort of Mazzy Star influenced songs, battling with their equipment but managing to fascinate and rounding off a fine evening.
There was the usual candles-on-tables, a joke from a Christmas cracker that was as stale as old cheese, and something about every record label that wasn’t the Bleeding Hearts record label being rubbish. Suffice to say, we all went home very very happy.
Lovely.
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Photographs by Southcoasting
