Nouvelle Vague

Meet in the pub at Kentish Town then Debbie, Duncan, Maria, Veronique and myself have a quickish Indian before scooting up to the Forum aka Town and Country Club. The support doesn't sound that great and not too disappointed that we've missed them. After the usual fannying around on stage it's finally acceptable for use by Nouvelle Vague. This is a French group who mainly play covers of punk classics in a Bossa Nova style which Veronique introduced to us. There are the two main men on guitar and double bass, two main women singers and various other band members which sort of rotate around a bit. They swing between Tracy Thorn-ish whimsical guitar, proper bossa nova version of punk songs, brazillian carnival samba and burlesque cabaret musical theatrics. The latter is very appropriate for this old music hall venue. At times it all went a little Rocky Horror Show but I guess they did play the Cramps Human Fly who were a little that way inclined. They are great in parts but in others did get a little wearing I think cos if they weren't really on top of their game slow and nicely sung versions of punk songs such as Too Drunk to Fuck seem a little contrived rather than a great take on a song. They go down very well though and give us two encores the last a great version of Love Will Tear Us Apart. Disappointed that they didn't play Making Plans for Nigel which is a great -tune both the original and NV's version. To be honest XTC in general aren't played nearly enough either on the radio or covered by bands. So we pile outside having had a very enjoyable evening and tube down south and straight to bed as most of us have to get up before the crack of dawn tomorrow.