We've been in the Rocket for an hour and a half so far, patiently waiting while amateur night clears its throat. I'm thinking, surely there's got to be some seriously disturbed rock and roll somewhere in this dirty, raucous, insanely too loud venue ...?The Tennessee Traincrash drummer Alex wanders on and off the stage looking lost in torn jeans, unemployable hair and a totally unsuitable sleeveless T shirt with DEATH OR GLORY hand scrawled in blood red lipstick, like a wound across his chest. He drops things. He doesn't test the bass pedal or retighten the widgets on the floor tom. He disappears. This is promising.
The punishing volume of the Rocket's PA starts to look like it might have a purpose, after all.
A knot of hyperactive people are RIGHT DOWN THE FRONT already. Not twelve safe feet away in a head bobbing semicircle of self conscious family and friends kind of way. Totally absorbed born in this kind of hell hole unselfconscious down the front with elbows on the stage like they owned the place kind of RIGHT DOWN THE FRONT.
So what do The Tennessee Traincrash do with their bid for DEATH? They come right on and play a juddering and splattering guitar n drums rough house noise with their whole bodies. They're not aspirational or competent. They are authoritatively The Tennessee Traincrash from the second they start, and they don't stop being it for a second. The filthy room, the stupidly loud PA with monitors all over the place, the retarded lighting rig full double spots on the front of the drum kit and nothing on the vocal mikes, the thinned out crowd ... it's the perfect setting for a three piece band with no bass player, two voices and holes in their only pair of tights.
They whip through the set with Alex battering the sparkly purple house kit like he hated it and Mark and Haley trading lines and chemical vibes on voices and guitars. Mark roars the (old) leather jacket off his back, Haley stands like a sexed up drama queen in punk tartan and ripped T shirt, throwing rock shapes and blazing out ringing chords like Pete bloody Townsend when the moments come. "Magazine", "Slut, Fuck, Fight" and my big drum-charge favourite "Lazy Bones" are all there, with six other raucous and knowing trips into the debris of 60's punk and 00's savvy. These are not dumb kids. They seem to know what they're up to with their classy punkish rock vehicles and the great fistfuls of personal baggage to hurl into them.
The crowd gets bigger as some of Leeds rock mafia slide in to gawp. Everyone howls for more at the end. We've got all excited now and we're not going to slide back to the pop quiz or the ten o'clock news like the last lot. We don't get the encore, damn the competition rules! But we'll all be back. This is, all said and done, what live rock and roll is all about. GLORY.
