Gracetonbury

German friend Lutz over for the weekend and having been bounced on his Friday flight and thus leaving crazy early Saturday we only have one night for punk rock infusion and want one close to home. Brixton Windmill is the obvious choice despite being billed as a BBQ but I guess counterbalanced by their new vegan beer Roof Dog.

We cycle up arriving about 8.30 and having paid our hard earned on the door we catch the last half song of what is probably the 7th band of this all dayer. I’m pretty sure with post gig research I’ve got all the right bands in all the right order but forgive me if I haven’t. At first I thought the DJ was playing The Slits’ Bongos on the Lawn with screechy shouting and as I didn’t make it as far as even seeing the stage for this set (not a mean feat at the small windmill) only later research revealed our hero to be a 12 year old kid called Ned "The Kids" Dylan. A shame we missed the rest of the set but mightily impressed one so young could sound so much like The Slits, who were probably about 3 years older when they recorded Bongos. We decant to the garden which is packed with bearded sockless youths. Either they’ve all descended for the night or the Brixton Streatham borders are so trendy now that this is their local. Either way once back inside it’s comforting to see the older locals watching the footie highlights on an tablet propped up against a pint glass. God know how they heard the commentary.

Next up are Keith TOTP of whom I’ve noticed quite a few folk wearing their T shirts outside. Turns out that thats because they are all in the band. I think there were 10 of them but as the stage is so small they were all intermingling it was like counting tadpoles. Not sure if the main man is Keith but he would sure make an impression on TOTP. He seems to like themes the best one being that he hates Peace (I assume the band) with a vengeance (er, I assume the band, maybe he just hates not having conflict) and gave us a lovely rant about it. Shouty ranting is what he does best and very good at it too. About half the band are guitarists who all play exactly the same chords which don’t sound impressive but is if they don’t know the songs which none of them seemed to. The intro to most was not the standard 1-2-3-4 but A - B minor – C sharp – D in other words telling the guitarists the chord changes. What with the rocking guitar, a bassist in the mix next to the guitarist who’s birthday it was who pogoed erratically and drunkenly, the sax player and a very smiley lady playing a saw, as in a woodwork saw, the whole experience was punk rock indeed and sounded like some punk garage club gig recorded on a TDF C90 cassette. So slightly better quality than Bongos but not much. Lutz informs me that the musical saw is a very common instrument in Germany especially in his part of the world where I assume they can't afford violins. Once enlightened of the beautiful soaring notes I did indeed atune my ear to the saw and was well impressed with the player both for perseverance in the face of punk rock adversity and staying in time and tune. All in all very anarchic and ending when Keith ran out of arm to write song titles on and birthday boy staggered off the stage. Puts us right in the mood for the night and we journey outside again into the throng and resisting the cooling bbq fare.

Keith TOTP : birthday boy to the left of me saws to the right

Next up are Ciccone I think. They're a four piece plying a more intellectual track with punky new wave tunes sometimes verging on powerpop. A neat chronological step on from the TOTPs and completely different in their togetherness. A tight well rehearsed sound backed by a great drummer driving the beat a male lead and two females on bass and guitar. Altogether a great sound and excellent line up choice.

Crap camera and crap cameraman make for dodgy photos. Jill Furmanovsky I'm not.

Final group so I guess headliners are a three piece. Great guitarist solid drummer and fine bassist. Songs seem to go down very well indeed and I'm assuming he's a local celebrity. The guitarist with the peaked combat hat is the main man and he's got a lot of charisma joking with the audience and playing gritty to soaring guitar based power punk songs. Obviously been around the block a few times and definitely the highlight of the night. Later research (such as finding out who is on the lineup which most probably take for granted before they venture out but is irrelevant when visiting the windmill) tells me that the last band are either Allergy or Abdoujaparov. Knowing that the latter contain a certain Fruitbat of Carter USM fame I realise that's why they went down so well and why so many of advancing years were jumping around at the front. For the uninitiated Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine were a fantastic 2 piece guitar band who played to a backing track. Abdoujaparov is a famous Uzbekistan cyclist sprinter who Wikipedia reminds me was nicknamed "The Tashkent Terror" due to the number of crashes he caused. Another victim to the 1990s cycling drugging culture. I digress. So after a 2 decade gap I've seen Fruitbat again in the form of Abdoujaparov. No photos I'm afraid as too mesmerised by Fruitbat's fretting of the neck.

All in all an excellent night out satisfying Lutz' lust for English Punk Rock. Turns out (the wonder of Google) that the all dayer Gracetonbury is named after Grace Creedy who I assume was jumping about to Fruitbat? Who knows.