65daysofstatic & Loops Haunt – Junction, Cambridge 09/04/2010

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All photos by Rich E

Our tormentor stands, innocently grinning, between two red spotlights. He’s Dundee’s Loops Haunt, aka Scott Douglas Gordon, and he’s frantically jabbing his middle fingers at pads and twiddling knobs to create a deafening hip-hop mash that disorientates, exploding through several layers like an auditory, incendiary trifle. It’s an insane barrage of broken dub beats over which R2-D2 screams and emergency sirens wail as the Tardis languidly materialises into the path of a boulder avalanche. This is the kind of music that can disrupt breathing patterns; trigger the synapses into misfiring. Easy listening? No chance. Refreshingly challenging? Oh yes.

As soon as 65daysofstatic walk onto stage and fire up the twinkling ‘Mountainhead’, the sensory overload steps up to a whole new level. Not only have we now got volume levels that threaten to take your head off but also a series of brutal strobes and searchlights that flash on and off, attempting to burn holes in your retinas. With such an overexposed image before us, it’s easy to compare the experience to whacking up the bass boost on your iTunes whilst switching on the fluorescent kitchen light first thing in the morning. During ‘Await Rescue’ some begin to retreat to the back of the room to lurk in the shadows, whilst the 65kids, front and middle, are only spurred on to embrace the inevitable oblivion. Wonderfully, ‘A Failsafe’ locates and flicks off the “overkill” button and things improve from here on in.

As three jerking guitarists adorn the front of the stage, lapping up the euphoric bombast they are creating, the drummer bangs out multiple rhythms in the murk behind steadily piecing the puzzle together like an architect. There’s a slight pause between songs and a playful suggestion from the crowd is granted a soporific reply from frontman Joe Shrewsbury – “Sunday night, party time. I like that”. It does feel suddenly like this is the one ray of sunshine on a dead night in a dark, dark world and, with the magical ‘Crash Tactics’ and tub-thumping ‘Dance Dance Dance’ spurring us on to embrace the light, the gig takes a definite shift from the negative into the positive – the sight of four extra drumsticks coming out of belts to bash supplemental skins is always a loin-stirrer!

Over half of the setlist comes off the vibrant new album, We Were Exploding Anyway, and they are sounding rougher live, with more bass and punch, but less distinct, so much good work gets sadly lost in the ether. Oddly, we get to hear rarities ‘Pacify’ and ‘Then We Take Japan’ aswell – hearing them nurdle there way into life is a bit of a shock to the system, considering some of the cracking songs they have replaced. There’s also old material in the form of ‘Retreat! Retreat!’ to mull over. It’s safe to assume that it’s not all smooth running by the end then, but you never do seem to get quite what you ask for with this bizarrely addictive band.