I have a fairly simple rule about eating in restaurants: for me, the experience is worth it if they can do something I can’t do at home. Now, I’m no great chef, but I know my way around a kitchen pretty well and can knock together pretty decent versions of a good range of dishes; so, if I’m going to a restaurant, and I’m going to be paying 65% over the cost of the ingredients for a meal, there’d better be a good reason for me to do so: it could be something I couldn’t easily cook at home, something with difficult to obtain ingredients, something prepared with more skill than I have, etc.
Broadly speaking, the same kind of thing applies when I go and see a band. If I’m paying money to see some people play some instruments, I want them to be better – or at least different or in some way more interesting – than the sort of racket I make at home when strumming my Les Paul (not a euphemism). Again, I’m not exactly Eric Clapton, but I can at least strum a competent tune.
Sadly, the two support acts we caught last night fell into the “Not As Good As Me” category. In fact, they fell into the “Never Likely To Ever Be Any Good At All, Actually” catgeory. Neither band had learnt, for example, the twin fine arts of “Tuning a guitar” or “Singing in tune”. Worse, they believed they were good; they, um, weren’t. The first band had a lead singer with the kind of public school pretty boy face that just ached to be given a good kicking combined with the sort of faux-laddish behaviour you get when kids first come to University and discover an endless supply of cheap alcohol and no parental control. The second band didn’t even have that, as their parents – a depressed looking pair of 40-somethings wearing the look of “Oh God, What have we created?” – were in the audience, presumably waiting to take them home so they could be tucked up in bed ready to go to sixth form the following day.
At least, therefore, the support bands did their job of making the main act look better. Or they would have done if any of the audience (other than ourselves) had actually hung around to watch Shuriken. Which is a shame, because they were actually pretty good – certainly, they’re all competent musicians, they can carry a tune, the drummer was rock-solid in time, they knew their songs and didn’t spend ages arsing around in between songs trying to decide what to do next. Most of the material was straightforward powerchord pop-punk sort of stuff; fairly predictable but well played and with stacks of energy. There were, however, two songs introduced as being “new” that stood out head-and-shoulders above the rest as being genuinely well written, well arranged and much more interesting pieces of actual songwriting.
So, file Shuriken in the “ones to watch” box. File all the supports acts in the shredder.