The Nightmarchers – Engine Rooms, Brighton 06/10/08

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On a cold, miserable October night, in the dingy hole that is Brighton’s Engine Rooms John ‘Speedo’ Reis (formerly of Pitchfork/ Drive Like Jehu/ Hot Snakes/ Rocket From The Crypt) and his compadres (Formerly of Hot Snakes/ CPC Gangbangs and others) once again bring his unique take on ‘Rock or Roll’ to the UK. Fusing heavy Riffs and Reis’ paint stripper vocals this is much more the pop side of things in comparison to the brutality of Hot Snakes or Drive Like Jehu. What remains apparent however is that Reis is a charming and hugely engaging frontman, who quickly has the sparse crowd eating out the palm of his hand, despite arriving on stage more than half an hour later then scheduled. At one point he gets the entire crowd to introduce themselves to the person on their left (luckily for me, the person on my left was Reis himself.’Hi, I’m John. Nice to Meet you’). He goes on to sing the praises of Brighton’s pebble beach, the glory of living near the sea and how he was sad to see the go-karting replaced with a beach volleyball court.

Despite playing to a relatively small crowd, Reis and his band seem to genuinely get a thrill out of performing, turning the audience into a sweating, writhing mess by the end of the evening. The pummeling drums of J Sinclair K and the hearty riffage power throughout the set, which seems over almost as soon as it has begun, a thrill-ride with one of our generations most charismatic frontmen.

The Nightmarchers on MySpace