This was our second show in our 20th Year Anniversary Series, held at Terrible Baby, and it was a great experience! A big thank you to the five bands who fully embraced the theme and gave the audience a rocking time. Special thanks to Aaron Michelson for the photos, our reviewers LJ and Hazel-Rah, and Ally for capturing video footage. Gratitude also to James and Owen for handling sound duties. A BIG thanks to Bay for the awesome artwork, and of course, big thanks to our wonderful doorpersons, Raven & Lucy.
呢次喺Terrible Baby舉行嘅我哋第二場演出（係我哋20周年慶祝系列嘅一部分），真係好好嘅體驗！多謝五個樂隊全心投入主題，為觀眾帶來一個震撼嘅時刻。多謝Aaron Michelson嘅攝影。多謝我哋嘅LJ同Hazel-Rah為我哋寫樂評。多謝Ally嚟錄影。多謝James同Owen處理音響。特別多謝Bay為我哋創作咗咁靚嘅海報。當然，我哋亦要感激我哋在門口做接待：Raven同Lucy。
❤️ Chris B xx
Whitt’s End
Corner Of My Eye
Times We Spent Together
Impending Doom
Is This a Reality?
Fire (Jimi Hendrix cover)
Save It For Another Day
No Sleep Till Brooklyn (Beastie Boys cover)
Ode to Music (It Doesn’t Matter)
It was hard to believe that it had been more than a year since Whitts End’s debut at The Underground at the now-shuttered Rula Live (RIP). After a barn-storming 12 months, which included a performance at Clockenflap festival in December, the brothers Whittaker (one now an adult) returned to grace The Underground’s stage with their lean and dexterous punk cacophony.
The beats were sharper, the riffs steelier and the crowd work smoother. The addition of the charismatic metronome Ferdie Ramos on drums made for a more cohesive live presentation. Set mainstays like Corner of my Eye felt like classics next to newer tunes, like Impending Doom, and a brilliantly executed cover of the raucous No Sleep Till Brooklyn. Taking on Hendrix is always a bold move for any band, but the trio brought fresh personality to Fire with a rough, punky, lofi take and big shout of “Foiiiiah!” at the end.
Save it For Another Day combined crunchy surf rock guitar with rolling rhythms, while catchy closer Ode to Music (It Doesn’t Matter) turned into an extended jam with a bluesy bass melody paired with snarling vocals and swirling, distorted guitar that exploded into a Vines-esque solo.
No longer a novelty for their young age, Saxon and Jarvis are now a well-integrated part of the Hong Kong live music scene, and this appearance at The Underground showed an effortless confidence that will carry the brothers beyond the city’s borders.
-LJ
KATER
星塵號
Tears On Smile
陣。亡
情感動物
Kater graduated to a full Underground show after earning plaudits from Chris B at their Shazza show last June. The drama with which every song was performed was genuinely entertaining, and the band clearly have passion for their music and strong friendships binding them together. Some sound issues aside, their four songs were consistent – Tears On Smile, the English-language song in their repertoire was grand and dramatic, recalling Evanescence with a muddy, thunderous bass, wailing, operatic chorus, synth backing track intriguing harmonic bridge on guitar
陣。亡 employed a mysterious picked melody and and soft vocal intro before low riffing kicked in. There was a proggy, Muse-like feel to the track, with singer Kamie testing the limits of her vocal abilities. 情感動物 “Emotional Animals” was very 90s alternativem with a memorable hook and metal riffing from guitarists Addie and Tim. Bassist Esther had great presence and came into her own on this song, her fingers running the neck of her instrument with precision and groove.
It’s hard to say that the band have advanced since last summer in terms of musicianship and stagecraft, but their performance was an enjoyable one to watch and the band, too, will be fun to watch as they continue progressing and gaining more experience on stage.
-LJ
Forever Never Ends
Let Go
You
Friends and Dreams
More to Life
Don’t Give Up
Here with you
A beautiful, lush, emotional post-rock opening launched Forever Never End’s set at The Underground. It was the band’s first full show in more than a decade and represented a reunion of sorts, with friends gathering in the audience to celebrate their return. The band created arresting soundscapes in a post-hardcore/emo vein, recalling the likes of Lit, Taking Back Sunday, Sunny Day Real Estate and My Chemical Romance in their grunge-y guitar and emotional, open-diary lyrics.
Lead singer Carlos was a natural showman with a fantastically powerful voice and stage presence bolstered by the band’s strong musicianship, passion, energy and chemistry. You used a loud-soft contrast with a chugging riff breakdown that exploded like the Foo Fighters’ Everlong. Although lyrics occasionally slipped into vaguely inspirational platitudes, the songwriting seemed genuine, if unoriginal in its production. “We’re not afraid to say that we’re OGs,” said Carlos. They were a cut above the other acts of the night and should have been headlining.
– LJ
Nitrate
Nothing
Left the Door
Dirt soil
抱
永在期待
Although a relative newcomer, Nitrate counts among its members several veterans (and I mean veterans) of the scene, such as frontman Egg, which would explain why the band describes its music as Brit Pop, as all of Egg’s past bands do.
Kicking off with a high energy number “Nothing“, Nitrate marks a clear departure from Egg’s signature punk/mod style with something with a much bigger sound, with vocal backup, heavy use of the high-hat and an underlying riff played pretty much throughout the entire song (one of the luxuries of having 2 guitars). You can still feel the punk/mod roots, just much more elaborate. “Nothing” was followed by my favourite track of the set, “Left the Door“, a dark, slow number which style reminded me of something Babyshambles would do. Again, probably on account that the guitarist, Bernard, being a very accomplished classical guitarist, the song had a very nice underlying riff and fills “that just works”. The rest of the set consisted of a couple of slow numbers, two of which were in Cantonese, again, something which I do not recall Egg ever did.
All in all it was a very enjoyable set, it was good to see the influences of a different line up – Egg played rhythm rather than the bass, and Jim was not the drummer (again, another “never” as far as I can remember). The sound was big and elaborate, filled with nice guitar works which did not take over, oh and the drummer really likes his high-hat (which is not a criticism, just an observation). However, probably on account of it being quite new, the band could definitely tidy things up a bit and be much tighter… and, most noticeable in the first song, the bass player needs to step up on his backing vocal, which was markedly out of tune.
-Hazel-Rah
Andy Is Typing…
Will be fine
Take me away
Everything To Me
I wish I could say sorry
Don’t believe
Branding itself an alternative rock band, Andy is Typing is the “oldest” band of the evening. Oldest in the sense that it has been together since late 2015.
Andy is Typing is known for its meticulous, tight (what I would call) heavy rock. Those turning up expecting such a set would have had a “reverse Hoobastank moment”, whereupon someone buying their album based on the track “The Reason” would have been dismayed by the style of the rest of the album! Of their set of 5 songs, 4 of them were relatively slow and mellow ballads – not that they were not “rock”, more rock ballads. Similar to Nitrate, the songs were characterised by underlying guitar riffs but with more melodic bass lines – although I dislike matching bands’ music to better known bands, but to give the readers some idea of the music, stylistically they were not too dissimilar to “The Reason”, I guess they were very typical of ballads from heavy rock bands. The last track the band went back to its root and played a heavy track, a great way to end the set and the Underground show.
As befitting a band that has been together for almost 10 years, the sound was really tight and the stage presence was excellent. I wish the band had played at least one additional heavy song, because this is where the band could have really demonstrated their skills across the board from bass through to vocal. However, a thoroughly enjoyable set.
-Hazel-Rah
Photos by Aaron Michelson.
由Aaron Michelson攝影。
Poster by Bay Leung.
海報由Bay Leung.
