Over the summer we had a new cleaner at work. Comes in a couple of times a week, and the other day she says to me: “I’ll tell you a good Christmas film for you, And. The Grinch. That’s so you!”
To be fair to her she does have a point, and as if to prove it, I give you exhibit 4,000,002 in the series of “Andy is a miserable git”: I haven’t watched one of these livestream gigs, nor do I have any intention of so doing.
For one thing, they are mostly streamed live on Facebook, which I consider just about as evil as the Tory Government (but not quite, obviously) and for another, it is a bit soulless, I imagine. A bit like those football games with no crowd where Sky pump fake crowd noise in.
“Live In Your Lounge” is another one of them. Now, happily for a miserable sod like me there’s a CD and DVD set. Which means if you can’t be arsed watching stuff, then you can just listen to the set instead.
Suits me just fine, because Revival Black are a damn fine band. And over the course of these 12 songs – all ten from last year’s full length and two unreleased ones – they prove it.
Essentially, it goes like this. They all packed themselves into The Live Room in Tamworth and decided to give that scumbag Zuckerberg some more traffic. The results are better than these things normally are, because this one sounds like its raw, sleazy fun, which means that more than most of these things, they’ve captured the essence.
So from the second that Dan Byrne begins “So Alive” with the words “hello internet” to the last knockings of “Wide Awake”, this is down in the trenches, warts and all, no airbrushing.
The band I always keep coming back to with RB is LA Guns. A band that swaggered but on their own terms, maybe the Liverpudlians are more bluesy – as “Hold Me Down” and the likes perhaps prove, but no matter, the ethos is the same.
The two guitarists – Alan Rimmer and Adam Kerbache – as always add a real tough edge to this type of thing. That’s what made Guns N Roses dangerous and Tuff, well not. And it works here too. It’s what makes “Believe” (one of the new songs) sound like the last gang in town, and what means “All I Wanna Do” stays just the right side of cliché.
More than anything, though, Revival Black – who missed out on some real serious festival gigs this summer – sound like they are just happy to be out of the house. “Give You The World” is full of beans, “Silverline” is pure and simple rock n roll. Nothing added, nothing taken out.
It’s that one too, where you start getting nostalgic. “You at home,” says Byrne “lets see your hands…..” which is basically the limitation of this. Like, when I shout at the telly watching football later, I don’t really think the commentators can hear me, so I imagine that you don’t feel part of these either.
Whatever, songs like “The River” (and whatever is down there sounds scary) and “Wrong Side” (the other new tune) are just about as good as this type of music gets.
Whilst they don’t do ballads, then “Midnight Oil” (a favourite of the band) is a little slower, while “No Secrets. No Lies” (perhaps the standout from the album) is as good here, the album’s title track is proper fun too and the last one, “Wide Awake” is the sort of thing that should make them stars. It’s that good.
If live albums like “Live After Death” and stuff are the Penthouse versions of the genre, then “Live In Your Lounge” is for those that knew the real fun was in Razzle’s Readers Wives, maybe I should watch the video to be fair…..
Rating 8/10
