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The Gamecock

Giant Tank Remedial Social@SunBear Gallery, Edinburgh
Monday November 1st
4 stars
The idea behind this new venture from Edinburgh’s longest serving promoters of experimental sounds is to provide an informal, semi-regular speak-easy for the burgeoning low-key scene that’s somewhere between a bar, a gig and a Happening. With the enforced closure of the Roxy/Forest/Embassy axis due to Edinburgh University Settlement’s spectacular financial negligence, such independent outlets are crucial. The reality is a loose-knit three-act show that falls somewhere between the original Dadaist Cabaret Voltaire and the Wheeltappers and Shunters clubs, with Red Death’s assault on a vintage Wasp synthesiser and Scrim’s dual burst of analogue sound-bending punctuated by impromptu parish announcements by MC Ali Robertson.

The Gamecock’s Total Vermin label-connected Stuart Arnot and Nick Mitchell play drum machines like type-writers while re-wiring the sort of ancient Casio and Roland keyboards that invented club culture in a manner that puts them through a forensically sourced retro black hole of swirling anti-rhythmic overload. By the end, all the machinery is slugging it out in a St Vitus’ dance marathon which, out of shape and out of time, is a technical knockout.

The List, November 2010

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