Baptiste - London Water Rats,11th July 2001

  by John Clarkson

published: 13 / 1 / 2002

intro

Tonight's Baptiste show has been fated from the start. Originally booked to happen on the Friday in the same week as the West London quintet's striking new third single 'Kissing With Your Eyes Open' was released, it has been hastily rearranged to take pla

Tonight's Baptiste show has been fated from the start. Originally booked to happen on the Friday in the same week as the West London quintet's striking new third single 'Kissing With Your Eyes Open' was released, it has been hastily rearranged to take place five days late on the traditional "dead night" of a Wednesday, as a result of the original venue the Barfly's sudden loss of licence. Despite this, and a string snapping just minutes into the gig, forcing lead guitarist Colin Moors to struggle purposefully with a guitar that he is unaccustomed to for the rest of the night, the Jesus and Mary Chain and Velvet Underground influenced Baptiste, however, never come across as anything less than impressive. The opening number, vituperative punk instrumental 'A Worthy Grudge is a Beautiful Thing', the B side to the current single, kick-thrusts the gig off to a strong, energetic start, and the set is closed equally forcefully with the jubilant 'Kissing with Your Eyes Open'. In between we are treated to two other songs from Baptiste's singles catalogue. These are breakdown song, the escalatingly tense 'Icarus', the back to the band's first single 'A New Career in a New Town', and an impromptu version of the brooding and soft 'A Small Victory', the flip to their second record, last year's 'The Quiet Times', which singer Wayne Gooderham plays solo and unaccompanied as Moors changes guitar. It is the band's new and as-yet-unrecorded songs, however, which leave the most lasting impression of all. 'Tired Bodies', with world weary, tired vocals from Gooderham and soft, surging washes of guitar and keyboards, perfectly captures the 5 am finish to what has been the worst possible day. 'Postcards', one of the band's earliest songs, reflects anxiously on the guilt that comes associated with an unrequited love affair, while the thoughtful 'Confessions of a Clumsy Man' , the most recent song of the set, throws suddenly and dramatically into its mix a skewed twist of discordant guitar. Not quite then the gig that Baptiste could have hoped for or planned, but convincing, diverse and powerful enough to keep all four members of Pennyblackmusic staff who attended talking about it all the way home on the tube, and long into the next day. With their debut album, 'A Life So Blue', scheduled for later this year, Baptiste are shaping up to be one of the most exciting of all the new acts on the London independent music scene.

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