Riot Lights - Whitehawk Football Pitch, Brighton - 24/8/07
4/5
Brighton's currently oversaturated unsigned new music scene is getting boring. Gigs are filled with nobody but aspiring musicians, and genuine audiences are few and far between. In fact I'm pretty sure if you did a head count, there would be more musicians in Brighton at the moment than music fans. With so much fresh talent the bar is rising higher and higher - and its tricky not to feel indifferent after plodding to yet another half empty darkened room which since the smoking ban smells like cheese and onion crisps combined with bodily fluids and is filled by a sceptical, seemingly disinterested audience who, if the music is very good, might even nod their heads. So I was intrigued when a band, who seemed to be playing their cards right with rumours flying about fighting industry and sparkling reviews in the likes of the NME, invited me to none other than Whitehawk (the Bronx of Brighton) to a football pitch for a gig...
Stepping over bottles of what was perhaps cider, perhaps piss, and timidly through a crowd of intimidating pregnant children, I was met by the band themselves, who fitted surprisingly well, Hackett collar scarves and shiny white new Nikes, with the gold laden chavs. It was reminiscent of when I first went to see The View, before they were signed in a broken bar in Brixton - you couldn't tell who was part of the scary fourteen year old Scottish mob and who was part of the scary fourteen year old Scottish band - and either way both probably would have bottled any f**ker who stepped out of line! Yes, the same sense of edgy excitement and terror, with an anxious desire to be invisible consumed me - but at least I wasn't in a smelly, damp, half empty club.
The band themselves look like NME golden boys The Enemy, only better looking with slightly more genuine dirt on them. The lead singer, adorned with Adidas trainers and a zip up is haughty, arrogant and angry - many parallels will no doubt be drawn between a certain Gallagher brother and 'Welshy' - these will not be quashed when he starts to sing either.
I was made to wait while Rubylux finish their 'one-long-song' style set of tedious English emo, and bark out from the echoey, montitorless stage at a more than exuberant football crowd of pikeys but finally, Riot Lights jump up onto the open lorry that acts as a humble stage and fiddle around brashly with instruments and leads. Despite a shocking sound system and no monitors, the band throw themselves into showing off to adoring grubby fans that heckle and danced around on the pitch. It's blissful to feel a genuine buzz about a band again - after a draught of excitement in a desert filled with motionless shoe-gazing fans.
The bass, driven and feisty, playfully charms the ear with a raw and sexy groove in my favourite track in the set, 'Time Is On My Side', while Jimmy's quirky kick foot dancing charms the eye. Colossal riffs and vigorous solos hit with a youthful, soft-core rock feel, but it was the backing vocals, combined with Whelshy's Oasis-style friendly aloofness and his harsh husky voice pushing hard which seduced me into dancing submission. Whelshy's arrogant nature and hard vocals could be considered an over indulgence, however Jimmy and Chris's more permissive backing harmonies and general 'mucking about' on stage make a comfortable towel nest in which to frolic.
Still moderately green, the live intros are a little samey, however every song has a car-stereo-sing-a-long quality with easy, playful lyrics, stories of teen-tomfoolery and adolescent anxiety which capture the hearts of cider holding ex/pre-convicts who sing along, learning every word. I am not surprised when talking to the band after the show, they tell me their management has recently been asked if they would play at a prison, yet they assure me in disappointed tones that most people 'don't think it's a good idea!'.
Riot Lights are an honest to goodness indie quartet with more energy and punch than Amir Khan and a brash charm which is sure to wink and smirk at (and then possible bottle) the Pigeon Detectives as they top the charts and take over the music sky with wings built on consumer friendly contagious pop-rock. As I get in my car to leave, a bottle chasing me through the air, narrowly missing my windscreen, I have (after initial feelings of relief that I made it out alive) that post gig depression you get when you leave a band, so full of promise, with the knowledge that next time you see them, they may well be dots on a packed out stadium horizon.
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