Old gig reviews: Fugazi w/ The Boom & Six By Seven, Marcus Garvey Centre, Nottingham 13th May 1999

[the level of enthusiasm in this review is quite spectacular. I formed my first proper band after this show. A few years later wrote my dissertation about Fugazi]

Fugazi w/ The Boom & Six By Seven, Marcus Garvey Centre, Nottingham 13th May 1999

After arranging tickets at the last minute we set off to see Fugazi at the relatively unknown venue that is the Marcus Garvey Centre. It took quite a while to find it, but after a few U-turns we spotted a mass of students and hardcore stereotypes and followed them, which worked rather well. We met up with a few friends and I bought a zine called Planet Blue. All the women in the Marcus Garvey centre tonight were vertically challenged, for some bizarre reason! Must be something in the water...

   The Boom, from Fugazi's hometown Washington DC, are an odd bunch. They play jazz influenced hardcore, taken too its logical conclusion. Yes, saxophones and trumpets! Actually, they had some good tunes, and even some vocals later on, but most of us won't be in a hurry to buy their records.

   Six By Seven are cool. Despite the normally disastrous presence of keyboards, they had some good tunes with plenty of noise and stupidly fast guitar playing (what's wrong with the upstroke, I ask you!). In fact, the keyboards worked to good effect, which makes a change! Kinda like a hardcore Smashing Pumpkins, but not that much.

   Fugazi are fucking amazing. If I ever see a band play a gig that good again I'll be the worlds luckiest bastard! From opener 'Break' to 'Do You Like Me' to 'Five Corporations' and awesome 1st encore closer 'Repeater', they hardly put a foot wrong! I was down at the front for the whole set, and 'twas a wondrous sight! Guy Picciotto is a good quality frontman, if a little odd for a hardcore singer. He moves around like a really fucked up rock star trying to gain entry to the Betty Ford clinic, but still appears cool as fuck. Ignore all the shit you've heard about Fugazi being boring live and playing jazz sections mid-set. Tonight they played some of their jazz influenced songs, but most Fugazi fans like these songs (well, I do anyway)! Bar final song 'Arpeggiator', they managed to hold the interest of almost all the audience throughout their long set. The stories about their dislike of stage divers and overly violent behaviour are true though, and Ian Mackaye took a stand against a few such individuals, including one man destined to become known as drunken bald bloke. It's hard not to respect Ian Mackaye, and it's clear that Fugazi have a sense of humour. "Has anyone seen this boy's mother?!" inquired the bass player whose name I can't remember after the first drunken bald bloke stage intrusion. Ian Mackaye then dedicated 'Great Cop' to himself in suitably angry fashion! Top moment: between songs I shouted for 'Five Corporations' (best song from 'End Hits' in my humble opinion). Ian Mackaye looks at me and winks! A few songs later, in the first encore, he checks to see if I'm still in the same place, nods, and begins 'Five Corporations'! Top Bloke! There was one quite worrying moment where drunken bald bloke lay down on the stage, and Mackaye went down next to him. I'm not sure what went on, but he either gave him a bollocking or a kiss! Later, drunken bald bloke sat down in the middle of the mosh and began to meditate or something! He was kinda doing a weird air guitar thing. It was piss funny! Those of us in the immediate vicinity laughed uncontrollably for a while, until someone picked him up and physically threw him from the mosh! Brilliant stuff! Over-enthusiastic-fist-waving bloke (guess) was in and out of the pit like a Swedish porn star, and drunken bald bloke returned later to apologise, whilst trying to start fights, obviously. The afore-mentioned zine was in a less than desirable condition by the end of the night.

   Anyway, this review is getting far too long, so in short, IF YOU MISSED FUGAZI, YOU HAVE FAILED IN LIFE! GO OUT AND BUY ALL OF THEIR ALBUMS RIGHT NOW!