Thanks so much to the bands that played, to the music lovers who turned up, to Shirley & Edwin for an outstanding job MCing the evening, to Nick & Justin for their reviews and huge thanks to Willem who has taken excellent photos of the bands. Underground is run by musicians for musicians and their friends. See you all last Thursday of July!
Love Chris B
| Kicking off Underground 10, Subdermal Abrasion defied management with a three piece of pure thrash metal. Playing four songs with energy, the first song in particular was lead by the drums in the style of Keith Moon or Ginger Baker. Henry Rollins dress sense mixed with tattoos & piercings, these boys from Chinese International School were grunting and more bruising than their band name suggests. Nick Lovatt Loud. I wish I could hear what the bassist was playing. The drummer was great, especially after he warmed up on the first song. Nice double bass work and I dug the crossovers! Justin Bahl Subdermal Abrasion |
Tommy Chung & All Blues very professional. With a baby-faced drummer who was nearly thrown out of Venue for looking underaged and a young bassist backing Tommy, he played tracks from the soon to be released album. Tommy’s gruff singing & his expertise on his neckless guitar plus songs that sounded wonderfully familiar but were yet original! If you can tell the difference between BB King, John Lee Hooker and Albert Collins, then Tommy Chung & All Blues are the band for you! Nick Lovatt I’ve heard of Tommy for years, it was great to see him in action. But, the real story was the fantastic young talent that he’s given a stage to. The drummer, was very talented, and the interplay between him and the bassist was excellent. Watching this drummer was like watching a drum video: perfect technique and excellent chops. Both him and the bassist have a fantastic future in music. The entire set was great. Justin Bahl More info at Tommy Chung & All Blues website! |
| Attracting their Lamma fans, Garoupa are punky folk or is it folky punk?! I’ve seen them on Lamma many times as well as at Rockit last year – always enjoy their music. Now a five piece, their melodies are even stronger. Alex’s facial expression catches the eye. As Danny Levine said “Garoupa remind me of my Grateful Dead days”…. Nick Lovatt I love this band..not just because they let us use their PA (and I stole mics/cables for our show at the edge..maybe I should’ve asked first….thanks guys). The onstage energy is toe tapping contagious. Great songs, great performance. The drummer, Magnus, is very musical. He uses his cymbals very well and moves around his kit with incredible ease. Justin Bahl Up to date info on Garoupa is available here |
In the style of Linkin Park and Limp Bizkit, GOSSIP headlined Underground 10 with their tight nu-metal music. With complicated chord changes and moments of progressive punk, I could see how they are in the semi-finals of the World Battle of the Band this year. An offbeat choice of an Anita Mui cover song plus their own originals all sung in Cantonese – the changes in tempo of their songs were exciting and kept me watching and listening. Enjoyed the Korg keyboards work too. Nick Lovatt These guys look cool up on stage! AND, they’ve got a great sound to back it up. The first song was super tight canto-angst. The electronics/keys really PHatten up big guitar driven music. But DAMN, that drummer is powerful and accurate! I thought it was weird that his snare was so low, until I saw that used his entire upper body with a full arm swing to generate the power and energy to be projected to the band/audience/foundations of the building. Yet he still possessed subtlety and dynamic control to be musical and not over power the band. Justin Bahl Gossip’s Homepage |
© Copyright 2005 Photos by Willem Van der Merwe
