OFF: Arthur Brown (was: Gig advertising)

[Jon Jarrett]

On Mon, 12 Mar 2001, Jill Strobridge wrote:

> Oh yes - Dracfest is one of the highlights in my Festival memories.
> Arthur Brown gave an amazing performance and it's such a shame it
> was never (to the best of my knowledge) recorded on video.   That
> guy has a really powerful stagepresence!      But equally to my
> regret he did a surprisingly understated solo performance at
> Glastonbury so who can say how he will be feeling at
> Canterbury......

        Last Canterbury he was excellent, as I posted at the time; would
have completely stolen the show if Gong had not been yet to play. Since
then, well here's a review of a recent London gig I was at for you:

--
Subject: The Crazy World of Arthur Brown/The Lucky Bishops, 22/02/01

        @ The Standard, Walthamstow.

        "The actual bands I was there to see, at least who were on the
bill, were The Lucky Bishops and The Crazy World of Arthur Brown. The
Lucky Bishops I've seen there before, and they're a perfectly competent,
faintly psychedelic, indie pop band somewhere betwen Supergrass and
Blur. Not really as good as either but their psych pop influences are
slightly different and when they leave off the happy bouncy
verse-chorus-verse-chorus numbers (which are probably very nice but I
don't really get pop live, I would probably like this lot better on
record) and actually let their quite good musical ability have front of
stage for a few moments they're much more engaging to me. They seemed to
do this more towards the end but that may have been the beer getting a
hold. They're good, anyway, but not good enough to make it when there are
such big bands in the same vein already out there.

        "But Arthur Brown, well. He was better at Canterbury, it has to be
said, and some of the stage patter was little modified from then, but he
was still pretty bloody good. He seemed to have trouble with a few top
notes (this was most noticeable in `Love is the Spirit', and I think he
made the absolute most of it because it's a song largely about the amount
of suffering he can take and so having him apparently killing off his own
voice to deliver it was quite moving) and he couldn't hold the crowd, but
many of them I thought were amazed to see this many Arthur Brown fans in
one place and had to talk to each other a lot in case they decided they
were dreaming it. But he was good. There's a certain something about any
gig that starts with eerie viola and the lead performer coming on in a
long coat and broad-brimmed hat, carrying a staff taller than he is and a
lantern, with his entire head swathed in black cloth so that none of his
features are visible. It was an up-close-and-personal kind of gig, he
responded to a lot of the crowd's calls (as well as spraying the front
rows with baby powder), made a note of what songs were being called for
and even, when someone yelled for `Traffic Light Song' (which you can't do
without at least one more instrumentalist than he had and another singer,
really) stepped straight up to the microphone and delivered a highly
scatalogical four-line refrain from earlier in the same album which left
the bloke in question well chuffed. The band were also pretty good, his
viola-/ guitar-player particularly but also the organist (who was playing
seated on the floor and was thus invisible to me for most of the gig; I'm
still not convinced the bass wasn't on tape as I could see no such
musician). The percussionist was in no way shabby either. But you don't go
to see Arthur Brown for the band, you go and see him, and he was pretty
good. Things of note were the first number, `Hard Rain Gonna Fall' sung
through black cloth and very eldritch, `I Put A Spell on You', which was
less terrifying than at Canterbury but brought out the pain of the song
very much more, and an excellent `Hoochie Coochie Man' (never heard that
with a Hammond before), as well as a new one of his own which is at least
the equal of most of the other stuff he played, called I think `Bridge
Over the River of Dreams'. And of course he did `Fire', a song which was
sampled by the Prodigy and is the only reason any of you know whom I'm
talking about, and which as he observed afterwards used to get him thrown
out of clubs as a devil-worshipper and is now played in supermarkets. He
made a fuss about doing it as usual, which was in itself pretty inspired:

 AB: Well, there comes a time in a man's life... where you have to do your
        hit.
(Cheers from crowd)
 AB: I might just not do it! [Saying the which he looks around and then
        gives a highly inspired version of the lead-in, `Prelude', and
        then... ]
 AB: I AM - [looks round at all the cheering faces in disgust] - No.
 AB: Perhaps it's time for a rest? Yes? No?
(Cries of "No!" from the crowd)
 AB: In that case definitely yes. [Lies down on the stage]
 AB: You know, lying here reminds me of the old days, sitting on the cabin
        porch with my uncle Cephus. He would sit there with his guitar and
        smoke himself silly, and imagine he was, say, John Williams playing
        some classical piece or other...
[The guitarist produces a fine little take on a stoned version of what I
        think was Mozart]
 AB: And then he would imagine, say, that he was Jimi Hendrix on the Isle
        of Wight...
[The guitarist turns on all the pedals and manages to still sound like a
        stoned no-good]
 AB: And then his wife would come in, and she would say, "You ain't no
        good! If you was any good, you could pretend you was Sylvester
        Stallone, playing the Verve's version of, of, Buddy Holly's hit,
        `That'll Be the Day'!"
[The guitarist's take on this is very difficult to describe, but for all I
        know that's what it would sound like...]
AB, standing up: Sylvester Stallone, ladies and gentlemen, THE GOD OF HELL
        FIRE! [and thus the song... ]

        "So yeah he was pretty good really."




--
              Spooky peanut terror bringing pain and death!
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     Jon Jarrett (01223 514989)      jjarrett at chiark.greenend.org.uk