The Longcut

Apologies to Derby’s Komakino, whose set I missed. I walk into a rammed Blowout! to find Nine Black Alps opening up with a terrace-style chant of ‘Everybody is a liar / Everybody has a price.’. I agree, am engaged and sneak as close I can get to the band, chopping my path through thickets of fashion mullets en route, noting the presence of many a skinny, smoking Manchester 'ace face' as I go. Before long, my interest has waned.

The hype declares that Nine Black Alps are going to be huge and Island have already shelled out to buy them, but they will have to do more than recycle second-class Nirvana riffs if they are to live up to their billing. Musically, they don’t hold a candle to The Longcut, who show them up tonight; commercially, the label’s hopes are presumably pinned on singer Sam Forrest, with his Ride-style mop of hair and not-quite-Kurt holler, becoming an alternative rock poster boy.

It should be noted that the Bierkeller have the audacity to charge £3-a-pint for their sole draught beer, but mollify this somewhat by offering monster, continental-style litre glasses of the stuff for a fiver. You do the maths, whilst The Longcut do the math-rock.

I’ve reviewed them for this site before, but it bears repeating. They are the best instrumental band in Manchester and perform at full power tonight. I'll allow that when singer / drummer Stuart sings, people can and do compare them to The Rapture, but when he drums, people shut up and listen, as Jon (bass, intelligent, insistent) and Lee (guitar, imaginative, inventive) take the roof off, buoyed his rattling power, boisterous intent and skill. Tonight, they find their stride and build their set gradually, surely, to a fierce peak, culminating in riot of super-melodic bass and frazzled guitar, before gliding to a composed finish, having made me a very happy man indeed.