Missed the first band, Arctik or whatever they're called, so nowt to say about them.
Born Solo: Oh if only they'd never been born at all. Arf arf.
First song was pretty shit. Basic Nirvana wannabe stuff. The singer even thinks he's Kurt Cobain, with the "I don't care" screeching. However, even Kurt Cobain was more in tune than this guy. Second song sounded like it was called The Fishing Song, although I'm sure it wasn't. Same again, although it somehow managed to be worse. Did they play a third song? Who knows. But what followed next almost had me in tears.
"This is an Alice In Chains song. man In A Box."
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooooooooooooooo........ .......................
A complete massacre of one of the finest songs by one of my favourite bands. For a start it would appear they don't actually own Facelift, because if they did they would know that this sounded very little like the said song. Man In A Box has a classic AIC chugging heavy riff. This guitarist played it like someone who didn't know what a palm mute was. And the singer? The only time I could hear him clearly was when he squealed "SHIT." He was obviously impressed that he was swearing in front of 10 people. No one else was. And the solo?????? I played this song for the first time about a month ago on my guitar, and my first attempt was better than this. And I'm a shit guitarist. This was just wrong.
Then came a Nirvana cover (shock!) which was attempted a bit better, but only because it was an easy song (dunno the name of it, but it's one of the ones off Incesticide).
The rest of the songs were in the same vein, ie terrible attempts at rewriting the entire Nirvana back catalogue, and failing miserably. Oh, and a terrible cover of Tourette's, which is probably the worst song off In Utero. Oh but it's such a FUNNY song to cover...
Advice for this band:
1) Buy a CD that isn't by Nirvana (they'd obviously only borrowed Facelift off someone).
2) Remind the singer that he is from Aberdeen, SCOTLAND, not Aberdeen, Washington. Hence, he shouldn't try to sing like Kurt Cobain. False American accents sound exactly that: false.
3) LEARN TO PLAY YOUR INSTRUMENTS. I couldn't really hear much of the "solos", but I could tell by just watching their fingers that they were pish solos.
4) Remind the drummer that growing your hair long and hitting the drums like a madman does NOT make you Dave Grohl. And it certainly doesn't make you cool.
5) Get some fucking charisma! Three "men" at the front, but no frontman.
Alternatively, just give up. Please.
Anyway.....
Dedalus: Fucking hell, if Born Solo were chalk, then these guys are cheese. And I'm talking the finest edam cheese in the whole of Holland. First song Burn started off with a bit of guitar, then drums, then excellent vocals, and then the bass. This song is immense. I was actually blown away... the wall of sound the two guitarists create is just so intense. And Stephen's vocals are astounding. To speak to him in One Up, you'd never guess he had such a brilliant set of lungs.
Anyway, then came the three EP songs, sounding even more intense live than they do on the EP. And they were performed perfectly. If you don't already have the Dedalus/Politik EP, then you must go out and get it. NOW!!!!!!!!!!!
Anyway, last song was Burn again, although this time it ended with Dave Officer pulling some nice guitar shapes, Stephen taking a fit (not literally, that would be hideous) and a nice wee drum solo. These guys will SURELY be headlining Leeds this time next year, as long as they write some more tunes of this impeccable standard. That was the only downfall of the gig, the lack of songs. Maybe a couple of covers thrown in would have been nice. Or even playing the EP songs again. But that's just nitpicking.
Apologies if that all sounds a bit back-slappy, but I honestly couldn't fault this performance.