GIG REVIEW: The Enemy
- Posted on October 18, 2007 11:04 AM
- 0 comments
The Enemy
Brixton Academy
17th October 2007
Review by Christopher Todd
There is something rotten afoot in the current UK music scene which draws so many parallels with the same scene ten years ago when it reached a nadir less low than the trough it is wallowing in currently.
For every Oasis, you had a Dodgy, for every Suede you had a Mantaray and for every Blur you had a Thurman. It’s ten years since ‘OK computer’ which was probably the last essential British album made which entertained from start to finish and it’s made by one of very few British acts who have made a must have album in 2007, you’ll now who they are, right!
The problem with a lot of UK bands is that they are making short sharp shocks, The Twang – ‘Either Way’, Editors – ‘Bullets’, Wombats ‘Backfire at the disco’, The View ‘Wasted little djs’; all great songs on their own, put into an album context you realise there’s very little else to enjoy apart from their hit track.
The Enemy fair better but their songs are akin to a wrap of shit speed, fun for a couple of hits and then its effects are pretty much zero. Bands have fallen back into the way bands made music before The Beach Boys and The Beatles started making proper albums, proper works of art rather than some singles witha some songs not as good added to it to make it longer. Music fans now treat music like they would a cappuccino in Starbucks and with so many average UK bands, with good reason.
The Enemy are a mass of contradictions, they are from the Midlands, talk with Northern accents and move with an affected Northern swagger, sing in a feisty London accent and act like a punk band in 1977 despite their guitars being bigger than them, probably still residing in their mothers homes and acting underground despite their label Warners spunking hundreds of thousands of pounds ensuring they get the pop pound.
It’s worked, a number one album and 4 top twenty hits ain't to be sniffed at and sniff the full capacity the crowd at Brixton Academy don’t do. With the average age of the audience being under drinking age apart from a smattering of kids getting rowdy on their halves of lager, they rush for space at the front with the unappealing chav element (short sleeve shirts and hair gel) who lap up the show from start to finish.
Kicking off with ‘Away from here’ and the crowd are with them for every note, for every sing-along which is easy bearing in mind that the majority of Enemy hooks are either ayyyys, oooohs or knuckle dragging grunts. Tom goads the crowd in indecipherable tones and fake Northern accent whilst fighting against the drums which seem to be turned up to 15, nevermind 11. ’40 days and 40 nights’ rocks them like they want to be rocked whilst ‘technodancaphobic’ depite its despicable lyrics “bang her on the backseat all night long” is a sneering punk highlight whilst the title track of their ‘We’ll live and die in these towns’ album is only entertaining as it note for note copies The Jam’s ‘That’s entertainment’ but makes it a bit shit at the same time.
An unwritten law of rock n roll is that the band should never be uglier than its fans, impish lead singer Tom Clarke makes the Elephant Man look like a beauty pageant Queen and the undercurrent of teenage aggression makes The Enemy live an unattractive proposition.
Do you agree? Vent away in our comments section. We dare you.
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