Although I can remember the how and when of me getting into Rollins Band (buying the Liar/Disconnect single on a sunny day in London in 1994), I struggle to remember why. Probably something I'd read somewhere - 1994 was around the time that Rollins was closest to whatever the alternative equivalent of mainstream is. There must be a proper name for it; "almost-but-not-quite-totally-obscure" doesn't trip off the tongue so easily. Whilst Rollins generally referred to himself as being one tenth of Rollins Band, there's no arguing with the fact that it is his throaty bellows and insuppressible rage that strings together the Rollins Band back catalogue. Starting out as a clear progression from the unhinged alt punk of latter day Black Flag, they went on to to play progressively darker and heavier blues-tinged rock, occasionally veering off into doomy Swans-esque avant garde territory. The arrival of Melvin Gibbs on bass brought in a few jazz-funk themes, before an all new band took on a more straight forward rock direction. And throughout it all, the intensity and disgust of Rollins is the constant that makes it a cohesive whole. Also, it couldn't really be Rollins Band without Rollins. That wouldn't make sense.
Since I live in Bristol, it's almost compulsory for me to like Portishead. So it's a good job they're pretty fucking great, really. To my ears, their albums tell the story of a post break-up spiral descent into insanity. The first record, Dummy, is all "nobody loves me" depressive introspection. By the second eponymous record things have taken an altogether more sinister turn, and the vibe has switched from "I'm going to kill myself" to "I'm going to kill myself, but I'm taking all you fuckers with me". Then there's a long period of uneasy silence... and then Third, by which point we're listening to Portishead sat in the corner of a darkened room, gently rocking back and forth and singing to the severed head in it's hands. Somewhere in the middle of all this is the very excellent Roseland NYC live album. It's one of those records where the band plays their hits with full orchestra backing; and usually you get the impression that the band in question is determined to get their moneys worth and it's all orchestra all the time, but Portishead have way more class than that. For some songs the orchestra hardly does a thing, because it wouldn't sound right; whilst on others, the additional arrangements conspire to an even greater sense of forboding menace. Or sound more like Bond themes. Whatever, it's all good.
Lords were a complete unknown to me until three and half years ago, when I happened to catch them at the All Tomorrows Parties: The Fans Strike Back festival. The idea behind the festival was that ticket holders were entitled to cast votes for which bands they would most like to see. At the end of each week the votes got counted up and the festival organisers would go and harass the top ten bands. Some wiley individuals realised that if they got organised and were tactical with their voting, they could pretty much guarantee getting a few of their favourites onto the list. As a consequence the festival was populated by a number of mediocre alt-wank bands that the generation Y kids with their achingly fashionable haircuts and ironic cardigans got very excited about. However, since this is also most likely how Lords got in on the act too, it's kind of hard to get too angry at them (apart from the one very tall generation Y kid with hair that was not only achingly fashionable but also the size of Neptune, who chose to stand directly in front of me as soon as they started playing). Then again, there's nothing even remotely cool-indie-tosser about Lords; so maybe the hip kids had nothing to do with it, and I do hate every single one of them after all. Lords play - or maybe that should be played, it's not entirely clear if they're still doing this thing - the kind of scuzzy life-affirming dancin' blues that makes you want to dance and shout and punch the back of the head of the lanky cool bastard with the big hair that's standing in front of you. If there was a band called The Black Eagles Of Death Zeppelin, they would sound like this.
