Ginger lavishes praise on Damsens during The Wildhearts’ set. The trio are sitting at the side of the stage watching when he predicts: “You’ll hear a lot more of them… when they grow pubic hair.”
The Liverpool three-piece are certainly young, as Ginger’s joke suggests — and he ought to know exactly how young singer Taylor Graley is, given that Taylor is his son.
There is something of the ’90s about them, too. “Beer Muscles” carries a hint of Therapy?, while its twists, turns and time changes display a musical maturity well beyond their years.
The third song might be so new that it still has a working title, but that instinctive gift for melody is already present. It simply appears from within the noise, as though this sort of thing comes naturally to them.
“We’ll just keep playing,” says Taylor, full of youthful hope. Damsens have all the air of three mates with everything still ahead of them — and the confidence to enjoy every second of finding out where it might lead.
They finish with a forthcoming single currently being mixed by Frank Turner. You never want to burden such a young band with weighty expectations, but Ginger is not wrong.
Damsens have got something. Keep an eye on them.
It struck me the other day that it is now 40 years since I was listening to the Top 40 on the radio when “You Give Love A Bad Name” came on and changed my life. I knew there and then that I loved rock music. That was that.
By extension, it is 31 years since I heard “My Baby Is A Headfuck” in a Birmingham rock club while waiting for a band called Sven Gali to come on. I asked the DJ what it was. Again, that was that.
Fast forward to tonight and Ginger does not quite make it to the end of “Failure Is The Mother Of Success”. The line, “You took a lot of knocks to get where you are today,” has seldom seemed more appropriate.
There is no need to dwell on any of it. We have all dealt with shit, and Ginger has done so more publicly than most, but throughout it all we have always had these songs. Songs such as “Nothing Ever Changes But The Shoes”, which sounds every bit as good as it ever did.
This line-up has now been together for a couple of years and the set is broadly similar to the one they played last year, but that hardly matters when the songs are this good.
“Sleepaway”, from 21st Century Love Songs, mixes effortlessly with the classics, while “Mazel Tov Cocktail” is particularly uplifting. “Kunce” has that unmistakable Wildhearts sound, along with some mighty lyrics, and “Maintain Radio Silence” is introduced as Ginger’s favourite song to play live.
They play the Cheers theme in full, and it feels entirely appropriate in a room packed with people who have grown up with this band and these songs.
Then comes the brand-new “Spider Beach”, with Carol Hodge’s keyboards giving it a gloriously ’80s feel, before “Vanilla Radio” is dedicated to a couple who have not been to a gig since 2002. Their reaction suggests they have been through plenty in the years since, and the emotion of the moment is impossible to miss.
“Everlone” — a song I do not think has ever been absent from a Wildhearts set — heralds a brilliantly constructed riff medley that includes “Cold Patootie Tango”, before “Slaughtered Authors” keeps the momentum surging forward.
“Diagnosis” feels particularly poignant tonight, but it is joyous too, and Ginger clearly feels every second of it. As someone who has seen him play getting on for 40 times, I do not think I have ever seen him look happier.
“Chutzpah!” ends the main set, and while seeing The Wildhearts has always felt special, tonight somehow means even more.
Given the reflection at the start of the evening, it is fitting that “My Baby Is A Headfuck” appears in the encore. More than three decades after I first heard it in that Birmingham club, it still has the same effect.
Seeing The Wildhearts on form was always magical. Seeing them like this is arguably even better. Surrounded by a packed crowd that loves them, they feel unstoppable.
