Grinderman
HMV Oxford Street, London
9th May 2007
A showcase of free events in honour of the excellent MOJO magazine at the HMV in Oxford Street saw Nick Cave's "side-project" Grinderman headline the day's events. Well, headline is a bizarre word, they played at 2pm. I snuck out of work for an hour to catch the latest work from the Australian maestro. The band had previously only played the ATP festival in Minehead, so this was their second public performance. Seeing as the band have only announced dates at minor music festivals, it is good for me that they decided to do this free show a few minutes from work.
A writer for MOJO came to the stage and announced "the unholy alliance that is GRINDERMAN" to great cheers. Indeed, the crowd had been patiently waiting for Grinderman to come to the stage. It was almost interminable, the amount of times I heard "1,2", "1,1,1,2" was nearly driving me to tears, while the HMV DJ, content on plugging records, seemed to think that playing the Feeling and Bloc Party to this crowd of middle-aged Nick Cave fans and curious office workers was a good idea. It wasn't and it nearly drove me to commit murder. But then again, maybe they wanted to make me angry and perhaps this was the point, because Gridnerman is the product of anger.
Coming on to polite applause, Nick Cave and the other members of the "unholy alliance" (Warren Ellis, Martin Casey, Jim Sclavunos) proceeded to play garage punk music beyond their years (well not really "beyond", they are older than most garage punk bands are afterall). This was a collective that wanted to tell us that yes they were now middle-aged, but that they could still rock like a bastard. Nick Cave still has that ‘70s porno look, with a Thompson and Thompson (from Tintin) moustache and stylish suit. He then proceeded to turn into the manic performer that he can be, twisting and turning on stage, shouting lyrics into the microphone, adding so many "fucks" into the middle of his lyrics that one gets the impression that he toned down the profanity on the record.
Highlights included ‘Grinderman' where the band gelled brilliantly, yet still sounded gloriously shambolic - like all garage punk bands should. The first single, ‘No Pussy Blues' becomes a brilliant and ferocious song, with Cave scanning the crowd, preaching to the converted like a radical priest and struggling for air. An amazing performance and some excellent guitar work from Cave here. Final song, ‘Love Bomb' is also the final song on the album. However, here it is more akin to a late ‘70s jam band than on the record. This briefly showcases the band's musical talents and also allows for them to diversify their offering slightly.
All in all, this short free set at the HMV annoyed me that I hadn't secured tickets for one of the festivals where Grinderman are playing this summer. If their tour continues into the winter, then I'll be definitely in attendance. I don't know if it is a side-project or the new avenue for Nick Cave's creative juices, but Grinderman seems to be a radically different route for Cave and I, for one, loved seeing the man on stage with passion and fire in his eyes again. After witnessing Grinderman, I'd not mind if he never played with the Bad Seeds again.
‘Honey Bee (Let's Fly to Mars)'
‘Depth Charge Ethel'
‘Electric Alice'
‘Grinderman'
‘No Pussy Blues'
‘Love Bomb'
by James Ketchell
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