FAT DOG & BOROUGH COUNCIL
There’s high expectations of Fat Dog but they deliver and then some.
NAC
This time last Friday, I was having my mind absolutely blown at the Highbury Garage. The Smith & Drake Ensemble, Spratleys Rats and Cardiacs - CARDIACS!?! - at the celebration of the life and works of the late, great Tim Smith. After the best evening of my life for literally years, anything - absolutely anything, however good - is going to struggle to hit the mark.
And so it is that Hastings-based BOROUGH COUNCIL have the task of opening the first gig I’ve been to since THAT night. Whilst they don’t wholly win me over, they don’t disappoint either, with a set of post-rock that hints at Explosions In The Sky in the instrumentation and late-period Mary Chain in the vocals. As the set continues, some Mogwai-style bass enters the mix and there are touches of Lou Reed’s early solo stuff too. Borough Council remind me of Norwich nu-gazers Sennen, albeit without the harmony vox. The trio - Haydn Ackerley (vocals, guitar), Joe Ackerley (bass) and Tom Healey (drums) - are clearly intent on letting the music do the talking and there is seemingly no attempt to put on a show. Whilst the music is decent, at times more than decent, it is perhaps not quite strong enough to wholly satisfy with no showmanship at all. Even when they do let rip it still seems like they’re holding back, almost embarrassed to really let go. A mid-set string change threatens to derail things - particularly as Joe doesn’t fill the silence - but it seems to fire them up for the last two songs. Things then loosen up a bit and show what may be coming in the future. See, I get the feeling both that this is early days for the band and that they will develop into something much more formidable with time and more shows under their collective belt. As it is, their set is enjoyable and I’ll be following their development with interest.
In terms of releases, South London’s FAT DOG are a fairly new proposition too, with just a couple of singles so far. That said, they’ve been around since 2020, are signed to Domino, have supported Yard Act, sold out the Scala and been named in DIY Magazine’s “Class of 2024”. Their biog describes their music as a mix of dance, punk and klezmer. What I’ve heard before tonight makes me think of The Rapture jamming with Jilted Generation… Prodigy, with a smidge of early Damned. I wasn’t hearing much klezmer...
The set opens with dog barks (from both the intro tape and sections of the audience). It is all very old school metal - until the gap between intro tape and opening song Vigilante, that is, when suddenly everything goes very Comet Is Coming electro-jazz. Boomtown is most definitely 21st century techno-klezmer. A storming King of Slugs prompts a wild dance pit (note: not the mosh pit it turns into later) and mass singalong.
Joe Love (vocals, guitar), Johnny ‘Doghead’ Hutch (drums), Chris Hughes (keys, synths, guitar), Morgan Wallace (sax, keys) and bassist Jackie (I think - whether a replacement or temporary stand-in for Ben Harris, I can’t say) know how to put on a show. Both Love and Hughes end up in the audience and there’s choreographed dancing from Hughes and Wallace. As for the music, it is dance, it is punk and yes, it is klezmer but maybe not as you know it. Like the aforementioned Comet Is Coming along with Opus Kink and O., Fat Dog also throw in some thoroughly modern Brit-jazz. And it is good, very good indeed. Don’t just take it from me, Steve Lamacq is here tonight and most definitely getting into it.
Considering Fat Dog have released very few songs so far, a good portion of the audience seem word perfect on pretty much everything that is played tonight. There is dancing as well as moshing. Everyone I see is thoroughly enjoying it. And, whilst it doesn’t bring me the joy my Cardiacs experience did, Fat Dog deliverer a very fine set indeedy.
