DUCKING PUNCHES, SPANISH LOVE SONGS & WE BLESS THIS MESS

 
Tonight is the last night of this three band tour and sees Ducking Punches returning home to Norwich.
 
Hailing from Porto, WE BLESS THIS MESS open proceedings with a decent enough set. Between songs, lead vocalist/guitarist Nelson Graf Reis describes the band as “conscious punk” and their FaceBook page mentions folk and punk. Well, I don’t get much folk or punk. This is fairly average rocked-up indie that frequently sounds like it is on the verge of breaking into Dinosaur Jr’s Freakscenebut never quite does. For all that, Nelson, drummer Bernard Queiros and bassist Ash Lewis are tight and clearly enjoying themselves. Their enthusiasm is infectious and I am smiling and taping my feet by the end.
 
Initially, California foursome SPANISH LOVE SONGS seem to be carrying on in the same vein as We Bless This Mess. A couple of minutes in and suddenly it is a whole different ballgame. Theirs is a sound rooted in alt.rock but with a healthy injection of Clash dynamics, dashes of Courtney Barnett and hints of post-rock. Dylan Slocum has a voice that somehow hits the middle ground between Springsteen and Brandon Flowers of the Killers. His and Kyle McAulay’s guitars combine to great effect, while bassist Gabe Mayashiro and drummer Ruben Duarte power it all along gloriously. Towards the end of the set McAulay, Mayashiro and Duarte leave Slocum on stage to perform a song alone. When it is time for the trio to return, their places are taken by three quarters of tonight’s headliners, to the delight of the crowd and the bemusement of Slocum. Such is the nature of last night of the tour hijinks.
 
And so to the homecoming heroes and DUCKING PUNCHES. Since I last saw Punches, I think that the line-up has changed (again), with songwriting, singing guitarist Dan Allen, drummer Pete Wright and bassist Ryan Hillier being joined by WBTM’s Nelson. From the off, the crowd are putty in Allen’s hands and the band can do no wrong. There are mass singalongs, banter between band and audience, in jokes and a partially successful attempt at a human pyramid. I have to say that it is the old favourites like Goddamn Coward, Six Yearsand It’s Been A Bad Few Weeks that really get me going. That may just be because I am far more familiar with them than the songs from most recent LP Alamort. I think I may be in a minority here though, as the newer songs do sound fantastic and are greeted like old friends by the crowd. For the last song, WBTM and Spanish Love Songs join Ducking Punches and the set ends with mucho hugging, kissing and back-slapping on stage. An encore would’ve been nice but probably impossible in those circumstances!