Spinlords of Spintania 25/02/08

First of, sorry - I got my gigs in the wrong order! I forgot that Spinlords were in February... Typical... Nevermind, Correct order should be easy in future as I will (theoretically) be writing them up before the next one happens... Oh and for those that haven't heard of the Spinlords (I would guess most of you ,as they're a North Devon band that haven't really gigged away from home yet), check out their myspace - make sure you finish a song as they like to go a bit odd mid song.

Right, on with the gig... The gig was a promo event for the 'Young Promoters of Plymouth' (or something like that) so the two other acts were some what incongruous with Spinlords (I can't really think of any band that wouldn't be really!). Having said which they both had talent, the first act was a solo acoustic set, largely covers, but well done, and his original stuff sounded ok. I wasn't really in the mood for chilled acoustic stuff though, and what with Betty Boop DVD on a TV behind him (I don't get it either...)and friends to talk to his set kinda faded to the background.

For the second act we moved down to the cellar of the venue, where a kind of stage setup was made by two floors of differing height (didn't really work very well as it just meant that the stage was HUGE and the dance floor was a bit small...). The second act were a little odd, they're called 'The RumuR' and I thought they were a covers band for half their set, only to be told that almost every song was original! They just seemed to be VERY good at using other band's sounds - I picked out an Arctic Mokeys sound alike along with some Razorlight, Fratellis, and other current bands sounds, but nothing very original in sound... It was a little odd, and somewhat dissappointing, but fun in the way a covers band would be!

Finally the Spinlords came on, and those of you who have had a listen to the myspace will be thinking the same as I was on the night - What the hell will the crowd make of the Spinlords?! Well, it wasn't all bad, by the time Spinlords were playing everyone was fairly merry, and combined with me and my friends going crazy to them they got the feel a little, if there was something of a step backward when their intro song kicked in - 'We are the Spinlords Of Spintainia' sung in and uber prog style and rocking out hard, before kicking straight into 'Don't Try to Spin Out the Spinlords of Spintainia'. After about 45 - 60 minutes of more chilled (for them) stuff, including a 20 minute monster (I think they lost a few people with that!), they stopped for a fag break.

On their return they started with a challenge to the crowd to successfully dance to the next song... Most people failed, but as me and my friends know what to expect we succeeded in writhing around in a suitably uncontrolled manner, loosely 'in time' with the music (I'm fairly certain the ditched time signatures for the song...) and also in looking like complete nuts jobs! But it was all fun and games, again, yet more alcohol had been consumed by this point so those that had stayed were getting into the feel and the second half went down pretty well. Finally, after far too much head banging (my neck hurt right up until the Streetlight gig on the Friday after), and lots of 'what about the OLD promoters?!' jokes they called it a night (after much protest for more, they managed a two song encore, but I think even that was pushing the venues hospitality).

All in all great fun, this band seem to get more talented every time I see them! I can't wait until they finish the album and do another gig that I can get too - well worth seeing if you can handle it!

Stay tuned for Hayseed Dixie today or tomorrow, or next Thursday/Friday if I'm lazy...