Stag and Dagger 2014 @ Various Venues, Glasgow, 4 May
Recent BBC reality show The Street painted a picture of Sauchiehall Street as a booze and piss-soaked wasteland peopled by confrontational buskers, reformed party animals-turned sandwich-slingers, and barefoot girls staggering home amid kebab remnants and broken glass. But as Glasgow's annual Stag and Dagger mini-festival returns, this year taking place in a string of venues along the much-maligned thoroughfare, it's easy enough to see the other side of the coin to the Beeb's reductive, exploitative take.
Here is a street packed with trendy bars, restaurants; and on this particular Sunday, a bewildering array of fashion-victim haircuts, cramming themselves into grimy, atmospheric basement venues like Nice 'N' Sleazy's and Broadcast; intimate pop-up venues such as the space at Coda Hairdressers; and custom-built gig spaces at some of the city's best arts venues, such as the Art School and the Centre for Contemporary Arts. As punters stagger back and forth between gigs, there is an upbeat camaraderie to proceedings, marred only by the lack of space at some of the earlier shows. That, however, is the order of the day at Stag and Dagger – watch exclusive sets by your favourite bands in intimate and bespoke venues – and get there fast if you don't want to miss out.
Our day begins with Pronto Mama at Broadcast. A local band, their beguiling brand of indie rock is underscored with tight, complex, polyrhythmic drums, so when they draw on the likes of 90s college rock such as Pavement, Weezer and Fugazi, it's simultaneously done with more than a nod to post-rock or krautrock's motorik pulse, with frequent time changes, brocaded with bright flashes of trumpet. It's an ennervating and exciting start to the festival, with the band's broad Glasgow accents anchoring us in Stag and Dagger's immediate locale.
Scary People at Nice 'N' Sleazy fail to live up to the name – they're clean-cut lads from Dundee, trading in the kind of soaring, epic rock that made Muse a stadium concern. There's a bluesy swagger to some of their more upfront riffs that recalls The Black Keys in places, and the packed basement venue reacts to them with a hearty roar of approval, especially after they whip out a few choice double entendres in their lyrics. With space at a premium, we squeeze our way through the crowd and back out onto Sauchiehall Street.
NY punk nihilists Big Ups blend anger with apathy on their impressive debut Eighteen Hours of Static, and the songs translate brilliantly in the flesh. It’s much easier to see the links between anguished hardcore and American indie rock when the quartet are letting it loose up close; the thrashing intensity of Goes Black’s throat-shredding chorus is appeased by vocalist Joe Galarraga’s murmured, panicked lyrics in the verses. Similarly, Justice finds a strange balance between meandering guitars and full-on freakery. The band give a couple of fresh cuts a test run before wandering off nonplussed, but the witnesses are left speechless.
Honeyblood's Stina Tweeddale takes to pop-up venue Coda Hairdressers next for an intimate set – the place, quite literally an abandoned hairdressers, complete with sinks and mirrors – is packed to the gunnels, so it is hard to catch a glimpse of Tweeddale as she sings beautiful, pared-down versions of Bud, and a particularly impressive Super Rat, in which she sings of a tender, yearning kind of hatred, made all the more ambiguous in its acoustic guise.
The it's the turn of unannounced special guest Johnny Flynn, who delivers a short set of country-tinged folk, his bruised, tender voice filling the now increasingly tropical room. His voice is nothing short of heart-stopping, and while he lacks the range of Jeff Buckley, he has some of that singer's ability to hold, warp and bend the pitch of the notes he sings – in such an intimate, acoustic setting, playing solo, he is even more impressive than with his band The Sussex Wit.
Over at the newly-refurbished Vic Bar at the Art School, Benedict Salter and Kitty Hall's Elara Caluna, also a local band, are beginning their set. Skeletal folk melodies are picked out on guitar and analogue synth, the results pale and frail, remarkably delicate, but with an undeniably visceral melodic core. There are shades of Beach House dreampop and Stereolab's louche, avant garde take on pop in their songs, and the band provide the perfect start to proceedings at the Art School.
Ballet School are up next – the Berlin-based band, fronted by the charismatic and seemingly tireless (or maybe just pumped full of caffeine?) singer Rosie Blair, tear through a set of fairly conventional new wave pop, but with Blair's remarkable range and energetic performance, the R 'n' B flourishes which stay just the right side of tasteful, and some 80s synthpop riffs worthy of Jan Hammer, they completely win the crowd over. Blair's charismatic performance is not unlike a young Cyndi Lauper – recently signed to Bella Union, Ballet School confirm with this performance that they are a band to keep a close eye on.
The Hold Steady have had a rough couple of years critically, with the departure of keyboardist (and key member) Franz Nicolay, but the group make damn sure to give it their all on the live circuit, as those gathered here early will attest. It’s a quick-fire best-of set; Boys and Girls in America’s Stuck Between Stations immediately sets the party vibe benchmark, but the heart-on-sleeve sentiment of The Weekenders hits home nearly as hard. The whole band or on form, but it’s frontman Craig Finn that really gets the audience pumped – he barely keeps still are he effortlessly, commandingly runs off one poetic anecdote after another.
Next up, it's Minneapolis rapper Lizzo at the Art School's Assembly Hall. The rapper, who has collaborated with Bon Iver's Justin Vernon in the past, and is affiliated with hip underground rap label Totally Gross National Product, delivers a bouncy, crowd-pleasing set, composed of the same R 'n' B hooks and tight raps as a classic Fugees gig. It's a solid performance, and the crowd love it, but given that Lizzo is one of the festival's few nods to hip-hop, it seems a shame to draft in an American when Scotland (and specifically Glasgow) has such a rich scene upon which to draw. When she drops a rhyme over a TNGHT beat, the crowd go mental - proof there's an appetite for home-grown bass and hip-hop, if proof were needed.
In their early years, Los Campesinos! could have been aptly described as wry twee, but with their last few efforts they’ve massively increased the dramatic stakes. Newer cuts like For Flotsam and Avocado, Baby (both from last year’s excellent No Blues) are simply thrilling; their spiralling harmonies threaten to swallow up the room. De facto leader Gareth Campesinos treads through a decade of emotional baggage and gallows humour, even finding time to weigh in on the referendum: “This year is an important one when thinking about your future,” he offers, before his troupe kick into You! Me! Dancing!, whose big leads remind the crowd why they fell in love with this band in the first place.
Jagwar Ma deliver one of the most polished, exciting performances of the day - the Australian trio combine block-rocking dance and electro beats with walls of FX-drenched guitar, and the looped and filtered vocals of front-man Gabriel Winterfield. There's a touch of classic Stone Roses about their sound, the acid basslines and reverb-heavy vocals capturing some of the psychedelic energy of the UK's second Summer of Love. Like Canada's Doldrums, the electronic beats and technologically-driven parts of their set complement some excellent songwriting, with The Throw, and Uncertainty, standing out as highlights.
Over at the CCA, Newcastle's Lanterns on the Lake prove why they were an excellent signing for Bella Union - Hazel Wilde is a remarkable songwriter, and her voice is like poured gold and soft cotton. When the violins kick in, its enough to bring tears to the eyes of more than a few audience members, with Wilde's fragile but courageous lyrics thrown into sharp relief as the band gently underscore her singing, before soaring off on wild, far-ranging flights in the instrumental passages. Paul Gregory, playing guitar with a violin bow, coaxes long, mournful notes from his instrument – but it is Wilde, playing almost unaccompanied, who steals the show (and more than a few hearts).
East India Youth delivers a rousing, foreshortened version of his live take on debut album Total Strife Forever. Dripping Down and Looking For Someone's layered vocals and Beatles-esque hooks reel the crowd in, before young William Doyle unleashes a heart-wrenching Heaven How Long, delivering impressively on that song's complex vocal acrobatics. Then he blasts through the more techno-oriented moments from the Total Strife suite, causing some outbreaks of enthusiastic dancing from the half-filled room.
The room remains quet for Tri-Angle beatsmith Forest Swords, too – augmenting his fuzzed-out, richly-textured hip-hop and dub compositions in the live arena with a bassist, Matthew Barns twists his set out facing him from acorss the stage, sculpting chopped, echo-chambered versions of tracks from the mighty Engravings and early work Dagger Paths, emphasising the sonorous, head-throbbing lower end. It's easy to see why dub luminaries such as Lee 'Scratch' Perry were so quick to jump at the chance of remixing his work – while rooted in hip-hop, musique concrete and drone, the thick layer of dub at the music's low end is its most remarkable and appealing feature, making Forest Swords sound less like a laptop musician and more like the fruits of a King Tubby session.
Royal Blood prove they’re another garage rock duo worth getting behind; though the sum of their parts may not amount to much power on paper, the Brighton-based partnership forged between Ben Thatcher and Mike Kerr oozes with badassery and sleaze. Kerr’s voice is blanketed in rumbling bass-tones and cymbal shatters, and it all comes to a head during a furious run-through of much touted single Out of the Black. If they relied on the blues factor too much they might have come off as a second-rate Black Keys, but as it stands there’s enough bite in their sound for them to stand on their own four feet just fine.
Albert Hammond Jr. is arguably more relevant a name at this point than his own band; though The Strokes are being swept away with the rest of the fading dance-punk scene, Hammond Jr. as a solo artist takes as much influence from modern indie as he does from golden age pop – St. Justice, the lead track from his most recent EP AJH, shows that he’s as breezy and stylish in his delivery than ever. A generously fleshed out backing band gives him the sheen he needs, and although his performance is a little too clinical, the breadth of the material covered here more than satisfies fans.
The partying done, we wend our way home through the Sauchiehall Street crowds, gorging on budget noodles and kebabs, thirst already healthily slaked, ready for the madness to begin anew next year.