LAUREN'S BLOG

Lately, Of The Pier Sucks

A couple of years ago I discovered the brightly coloured four-piece Late of the Pier, playing at the first Underage. I remember being blown away by the energy and originality of the group – they drew by far the most excited crowd, despite competition from headliners such as Patrick Wolf, the Maccabees and Jack Penaté. When new-rave troupers SuperSuper magazine made their promo video for the festival, which aimed, in true 2007 style to show “teenz havin a totez krazy tym”, they used footage from the set, thus was the frenzy that ensued from their decidedly electro but surprisingly blues-y rock n’ roll.

Further research into the band yielded the entirety of their unmastered EP, ‘Zarcorp’, available for free download. It was (and still is, if you can find it!) really great. For me, the main appeal was the juxtaposition of the Bowey-like nasal quality to Sam Eastgate's vocals, the candy-pop synths and the growling roughness of the guitar which had, at times, a tendency to demise into grunge. I went to see the band again, this time at the Oxford Zodiac or Carling or 02 or whatever it’s called this week, and wasn’t disappointed. In one of the smaller of the venue’s rooms, the atmosphere was chilled, and the crowd fairly unpretentious. The band themselves were hanging out in the venue, I had a great chat with keyboardist Potter, which resulted in me giving him a picture of a VW van and him thieving the purple feather mask I was wearing, to then dedicate their track ‘VW’ to me and invite me on stage to retrieve it! Their set was highly theatrical, and I saw again that energy that had so ensnared me in Victoria Park. They responded to the audience and received the same in return. Every song was received like an anthem, even the previously unheard ones, but especially ‘The Bears are Coming’, which began with the band wacking strips of wood with a stick on a construction that looked somewhat like a strung-up glockenspiel!

Sometime last year the band got signed to Parlophone and for me, this is where things started to go downhill. They released their album, primarily featuring tracks from Zarcorp. The songs, although recognisable, are now radically different. Sam’s voice has been mastered and overly layered to create a much smoother, but much less enthralling sound. The electronic sounds sound too synthetic, the irony of the kitch-pop replaced with something that just sounds….kitch. Unintentionally kitch. And the whole grunge element – departed forever! Admittedly, the new sound is more accessible, which may account for the average age of the audience, when I went to see them at Zocarlo2 a few weeks ago, being somewhere around 14. This time, the band were playing in the largest room in the club. When the band took to the stage, they looked somewhat haggard. Although it would have been more difficult with a larger crowd, there was none of the banter that I remember from previous gigs – something they achieved before the equally large crowd at Reading last year magnificently. They steamed through the album, talking only to complain about the heat. At the front of the crowd, kids were hitting each other and jostling (on the plus side, the energy expended trying to stay upright was probably on par with about 3 hockey matches),and from about 9 heads from the front onwards everyone was standing stock-still. I left feeling very sweaty and, frankly, a little short-changed.

In fairness, this could have just been an off-day. However, a meta-analysis via Facebook yielded similar results from their set of the same tour at Southampton Joiners and one or two London venues, as well as in-store at Rough Trade (although record store gigs are rarely the most energetic). I realise this rant may sound a little cliché – however, this is not about “selling out” or any of that kind of pretentious bullshit. It’s about a significant decline in quality. Within about a year a potentially great band have significantly declined and this makes me sad.

Have been away skiing for the last two weeks in Chamonix.......loads of snow but melting fast!! Went off-piste into Switzerland for a day where I nearly frightened myself to death!! I'm no good at off-pists skiing! Back in Oxford now for a bit - next trip is to the Isle of Man for the TT races......taking my small m'bike for racing around on.....should be fun!
Where are all your questions......they seem to have dried up! Lauren will write a blog about her various favourite bands soon......and I have just bought Peter Doherty's solo album which is really very good!

Dr.Mike