Music > Live Reviews
Eddie And The Hot Rods
The Adrian Flux Waterfront
09/12/17
Sometimes, the very best gigs are the ones where the expectations are, perhaps, a little low. I caught a bit of Eddie And The Hot Rods’ set at the Cambridge Rocks festival earlier in the year and I know next to nothing about Department S. Tonight, I am expecting to be entertained but not blown away by Eddie And The Hot Rods and really am not expecting much at all from Department S. Oh, how wrong I am. I dunno why. Maybe the stars aligned, maybe it is the JD talking, maybe I am just up for it after a long and frankly shite day at work or, maybe, the bands deliver properly brilliant set…
First up are Department S. Originally active from '80 to '82, the band appeared at the tail-end of punk, new wave and post-punk. Reactivated in 2007, the current line-up features one original member in keysman turned vocalist Eddie Roxy. Following an intro tape including the theme from Thunderball and kicking in with Kings Of The World it is immediately clear that I have underestimated this lot.
For most of the 10 song, 45 minutes set, Roxy stands stage centre, looking like a cross between Subway Sects’ Vic Godard and Kaiser Chiefs’ Ricky Wilson whilst affecting the bored disinterest of Liam Gallagher or Faris Badwan of The Horrors with bursts of animation. Talking to Roxy afterwards, it is clear he is deeply passionate and the apparent disinterest is an effective pose. Stage left, bassist and ex-PiL man Pete Jones looks and sounds like a refugee from Madness. Stage right, guitarist Phil Thompson has the elegantly wasted look and sound of prime Johnny Thunders, whilst drummer Alan Galaxy anchors it all with a style that is somehow powerful yet economical.
The cover of The Dead Boys’ Sonic Reducer, the twisted punk disco of Going Left-Right and the closing trio of Wonderful Day, Is Vic There? (complete with a burst of Babylon's Burning) and relatively new song When All Is Said And All Is Done show just what a great and still vital band Department S are. A truly cracking set. They say don’t meet your heroes. In conversation after their set, all four members of Department S came across as thorough-going good chaps.
Now for Eddie And The Hot Rods. The Hot Rods have their origins in the Pub Rock scene that sprang up in London and Essex in the early 70s, that also gave us the likes of Dr Feelgood and Ian Dury and without which - arguably and irrespective of what McLaren, Lyndon et al might tell us - British punk would have been a very different beast.
Like Department S, there’s only one original member left, in vocalist Barrie Master. Backing up Masters for a good while now are Simon Bowley, Ian "Dipster" Dean and Richard Holgarth (drums, bass and guitar, respectively). The four-piece play with such good humour, energy and apparent joy just to be on stage that it is a pleasure to watch, whilst the sound is based in the high-energy, maximum R ‘n’ B that The Who smashed out in their heyday, with a heavy dose of good ol’ fashioned rock ‘n’ roll.
The seventy five minute set takes in oldies, covers and more recent stuff. Picking highlights from the eighteen songs is nigh-on impossible. If I am forced to name some, I’ll go for the covers - The Monkees’ Stepping Stone, J Geils Band’s Hard Driving Man complete with ferocious harmonica solo and Them’s Gloria - along with Teenage Depression, Telephone Girl, You Better Run and High Society. Of course, Do Anything You Wanna Do is just glorious.
The Waterfront Studio is far from full tonight and most of the audience - me included - aren’t spring chickens but there is a good mix here from the average man and woman in the street to stud-encrusted punks, a couple of impeccably turned-out suedeheads and metal heads. What we all have in common is a desire to, if not dance our asses off, then burn a few calories jiggling like loons.
On pretty much any other night, with pretty much any other support, I would be raving about how brilliant The Hot Rods have been. As it is, Department S take the night for me. Both bands have been cracking, I come out on an absolute high but it is Is Vic There? that I am singing all the way home.