Sounds
June 3, 1978
A Touch Of Class
Soft Boys/Astronauts
by Paul Chautauqua
The Hope still has some of the atmosphere of its '77 heyday about it: no-one looks uptight about being cramped together in this damn cellar, craning your neck to glimpse the band and being deafened by the bounceback off the walls. Instead they joke and catcall happily between nosediving another pint, all contributing to a very real happiness feel you totally miss at larger venues.
The Soft Boys are a touch of class: introducing themselves in deviant fahion as "Larry And The Bicycles" and calling their music "dance music" (quip on Saturday Night Fever?) they jerked everyone into motion with something of the Force about them, all red light and hum. The first few numbers included their anthem "Give It To The Soft Boys" were lifted straightout of early Clapton, Disraeli Gears, slow bass rundowns from from Andy Metcalfe and clicking lead from Kimberley Rew. They demonstrated how to overcome feedback probs of the type that had hazed up tbe support act: just play gently, clearly, and in good time.
Main efforts are directed at the evocation of mood, growling lyrics over deep-driving rhythms, but they break over fresher ground than that: Presley's "Mystery Train" was rendered with chugging backbeat and choruses like steam whistles, a superb example of what can be achieved by imaginative arrangements of a simple rhythm element.
Vocalist Robyn Hitchcock, psycho stareout of the audience, growls through, "Sandra's having her brain out...having her heart out...his soul dry cleaned". Keep that one in the set forever, it'll become a classic. As though that's not sufficient we are fed a seafood trilogy, "Where are the Prawns?", "Return of the Sacred Crab", etc., and are rolled off our feet by the single "(I Want To Be An) Anglepoise Lamp" (What?).
But the goofiness doesn't get anywhere near the music, John Cale's "Heartbreak Hotel" is driven line after line with punch and a spirit of theatrical malevolence. Just as it was all getting a bit too slick they fooled us with an encore of The Allman Brothers' country ditty, "I Like Bananas", even including those daft guitar solos.
This is Jellyrock, hard to grasp because it's over-gooey and soft, a waste of time trying to pin down. These boys rip off everything in sight and exude un air of uncaring supercool: mite too clever for yours truly, but everyone looked happy. They'll probably go down well in the current state of the art.
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