Coffee-Table Notes

Cabaret Voltaire, Edinburgh, Thu 6 September For a quarter of a century, Whitehouse have existed in a flabby imaginary hinterland where late cock-er-knee geezer Mike Reid duets with shamed gang-master Gary Glitter. Or at least that’s how it seems as the double act of William Bennett on old-school techno clatter and Philip Best on incomprehensible potty-mouthed harangues play their first ever Edinburgh show, a treat made ever more possible since Bennett took up residence here. Named after deceased anti-porn campaigner Mary Whitehouse, the duo’s shtick is simple. Two middle-aged geezers in market-trader shades offload a bucket load of venom before whipping their shirts off to show off their pasty flesh, throw X-Factor shapes and indulge in a spot of casual frottage. This is hardcore, then, on every level. Except, not really, because for all the sturm-und-drang relentlessness, their camp, cheeky-chappy charm comes on more Grumbleweeds than guerrilla warfare, resembling a pissed-up Gilbert

Still Game It may be 15 years since the last album by Happy Mondays, but as Neil Cooper finds out, Shaun Ryder refuses to act middle-aged ‘Hola!’ Shaun Ryder is just back from Spain, and has clearly been learning the language. In between shows leading up to next week’s T on the Fringe gig, though, the surprisingly sharp and decidedly affable Happy Mondays frontman is at home, ‘catching up on me telly. I’m really liking Heroes just now.’ Such an image of domesticity is a far cry from Happy Mondays’ Madchester heyday, when, by melding indie guitars to dancefloor shuffle, they more or less invented Baggy, democratising the dancefloor as they went. The Mondays’ shambolic gang mentality was a long way from the too-cool-for-school attitude that then prevailed in a music scene geared towards posh-boy students. Ryder and co proved anyone could do it. As original Mondays Ryder, Bez and Gaz Whelan return with Uncle Dysfunktional, the band’s first album of new material in 15 years, just how

Voodoo Rooms, Edinburgh, Sun 13 April 2008 4 stars Almost thirty years after Josef K split up, the return of the band’s singer in his first full live solo show for nineteen years is a major event. With Haig’s old band finally acknowledged as a major influence on a new generation of artfully inclined guitar acts, it’s a chance too to see how the original songs have survived. Following recent guest slots with Nouvelle Vague, there remains a worry that Haig might be upstaged by the indie disco that precedes him. As it is, the flamboyant salute he opens this first leg of a mini tour that takes in Glasgow and Dunfermline next month with is a healthy sign of nerves and dry self-deprecation. Wielding a fire engine red guitar and sporting tinted shades and the skinniest jeans this side of Kate Moss, Haig and the band who accompanied him on last year’s Cathode Ray project launch into the punk funk of Trouble Maker, opening track of the just-released Go Out Tonight album. In a set split fift

The tour guide at Verdant Works is doing the rounds. The weather outside Dundee’s old jute mill turned heritage centre may be inclement, but, immaculately turned out in top hat, tails and elegantly groomed silver moustache, he looks ready for anything. Leading his party Pied Piper-like through the museum’s tea and gift shop, the guide’s outfit lends him the authoritative air of a nineteenth century industrialist. The show-room dummies posed in various shades of grey who line his route concur. Inside Verdant Works itself, makeshift catwalks are being contrived among equally off-limits looms that once span with life, but which are now educational ornaments to remind visitors of their former function. Across in the court-yard, with the Sun shining down past where the roof used to be, Grid Iron theatre company are rehearsing Yarn, their latest site-specific show. Music is playing, and, as the six actors gingerly parade their way around the space, navigating the puddles as they go, a low-ke

Edinburgh’s premiere promoters of aktionist noise happenings commemorate a decade of cottage industry chunder with three bloody Sundays of non-Fringe-based hissy fits. Five reasons for their essentialness follow. 1 It’s not music. It’s just noise And there is nothing like it. The events feature Wire magazine-approved acts from Paris, Brighton and Leeds, including several you may or may not have ever heard of. Do Ashtray Navigations, Ocelocelot, Shareholder, Towering Breaker, Made Out Of Wool, Eye Shaking Kingdom, Blue Sabbath Black Fiji, Muscletusk or Playground Meltdown ring any bells? 2 Its not big. Or clever But at various times it promises a stomach-churning, vomit-inducing, spiteful, ugly and puerile racket. All of which are to be encouraged. 3 It repeats itself Usurper play three times, though you won’t always hear them. The GT house band scritch, scratch, bubble and squeak as the quietest unplugged act ever. 4 It’s got the best merchandise stall on the planet An array of hand-cr

Spies In The Wires@Cabaret Voltaire, Edinburgh, Thu June 14 2007 4 stars The whiff of freshly heated maize that accompanies Sellotape’s vocal version of Hot Butter’s 1972 electro-disco hit, Popcorn (the first ever totally synthesiser-based single to chart, pop-pickers), may take its subject matter literally, but it’s still a lot more subtle than Crazy Frog’s pummelling desecration of one of the catchiest ditties in pop history. Fronted by uber-bobbed girl about town and PVC-panted mein hostess of the Girlelectro night at super student hang-out The Southern, Viki Sellotape, Sellotape the band do that Rough Trade circa 1978 Ladbroke Grove squat rock shamble. Making their live debut, they go hell for, um, leather with an energetic and unstudied bounce through the DIY post-punk messthetics handbook. Think Kleenex or the Delta Five, with an in-built ramshackleness tempered by a vocal style betraying a smidgen of Siouxsie Sioux. It’s the contents of the popcorn making machine, though, which

The Subway, Edinburgh, Mon 11 Sep 2006 3 stars What to do with a sparse audience on a soggy Monday night? If you’re electro-saccharine noise terrorists Gay Against You, you drag all 20-odd onstage with you, thus immediately quelling the venue’s structural awkwardness. In G.A.Y.’s world of playground chalkboard subversion, audience participation has never been so much fun. Clad in micro-shorts and 118 118 running vests, these two little boys hurl themselves into their routine with a recklessly scattershot abandon that might fall apart any second. More than mere comedy gabba, this is how Prince would’ve sounded if he’d been born a hyperactive Gameboy addicted runt, soaked in sugar, and spewed up the vilest tones a Casio can conjure. The List, issue 560, 2 Oct 2006 ends