Flashguns - Rescue Rooms, Nottingham, 28/9/2009

by Sarah Mwangi

published: 24 / 9 / 2009

Flashguns - Rescue Rooms, Nottingham, 28/9/2009

At the Nottingham Rescue Rooms, Sarah Mwangi finds energetic teenage indie rock band Flashguns more mature than their youth would suggest, but their ideas coming out too thick and fast sometimes for the good of their music

Article

Firstly, at the age of 22, I don’t think I’m old, but damn, I sure felt it tonight. I felt it with the people around me, with the people at the bar and certainly with those before me. Secondly, as a principle, I generally don’t listen to bands that are younger than me. It’s a rule based simply on my reluctance to be the oldest person in a room and besides what we could possibly have in common. Thirdly, it is a diminishing rule, as it’s getting harder to abide to; unless I want to carry my iPod to my deathbed. So, with the Flashguns in front of me, I tried to get past the age gap, (seriously, they must have been like 16 years old*) which was surprisingly easy to do as they displayed a sound far mature than their fresh-faces suggested. Spry melodies, swirling walls of sound, and ideas aplenty were all present. Well, maybe all too present. They’re a talented bunch of kids no doubt, but it just wasn’t coming together as it should. For the first trio of songs I basked in the glow of finding a band worth noting, but flaws started to appear in the subsequent tracks. With song after song, ideas were coming out thick and fast as they switched from melody to melody far too often in each song and created a wall of sound that accumulated from noisy crashing cymbals and shredding guitar work. Their flaws, however, aren’t detrimental to their future, as they do have youth on their side. They have the time to concentrate on these songs more tenderly. To refine them in order for them to become cohesive products of their undoubtedly inspired minds. Admittedly, it is exciting when you find a band at the grasp of something special so early in their career. And amidst the undecipherable vocals, the melodic slurs of ‘I Don’t Not Love You’ and ‘St George’, which were accompanied by energetic stop-start guitar riffs and building drum rolls, illuminated Flashguns’ potential. They do, however, need to try harder next time around so as not to be overshadowed as they were by a choir of drunken freshers, who were doing their best to ruin, even massacre Radiohead’s ‘In Rainbows’ which played as the venue’s intermission filler (although in the freshers’ defence, they did know the songs virtually word for word). *they are all going to uni or at least dropping out soon, so in fact they must be around 19.