LOW / KID DAKOTA, WOLVERHAMPTON WULFRUN HALL, 19TH FEBRUARY 2005
Kid Dakota, who feature Low bassist Zak Sally on a couple of songs and whose album The West Is The Future was released on Low's Chairkickers Union label last year, are a really hard act to place.
The artwork for the album (which I subsequently purchase) is by Will Schaff who also did some of the drawings for Godspeed! You Black Emperor's Lift Yr Skinny Fists Like Antennas To Heaven, and there is a similar sense of a bleak and apocalyptic present about Kid Dakota's music, though their fusion of punk and country is much more accessible than the Canadians' musical output.
On stage in front of an audience almost completely unfamiliar with them, they look at ease, concentrating on louder songs like 'Pilgrim' and the excellent 'Winterkill' rather than on the more moody and ambient album tracks like 'Homesteader'.
Vocalist / guitarist Darren Jackson (not the former Newcastle and Hibernian striker, I might add) has a voice vaguely reminiscent of Brian Molko but far less irritating than that might imply, and looks like a thinner Jack Osbourne. But the real star, from a visual point-of-view, is the similarly besuited drummer, who adds to and dismantles his kit midsong.
From all the fuss that Low's new Dave Fridmann produced album The Great Destroyer has kicked up in indie circles, you'd be forgiven for thinking it's like Dylan gone electric all over again. Let's get one thing clear, though: they've betrayed no-one. If they felt the time was right to move on and leave their "slo-core" days in the past, then it's their prerogative.
In any case, the new material might be quicker, brighter and - most obviously - louder than before, but it's still unmistakeably Low. Whereas before you could see through to the bare bones, they're now fleshed out with a gorgeous guitar fuzz. For the most part, 'Monkey' and 'Pissing' excepted, the darkly sinister edge of 2002's Trust is gone - from that record, only '(That's How You Sing) Amazing Grace' appears tonight - and in its place a newfound warmth. It's entirely appropriate that 'Dinosaur Act', the song from Things We Lost In The Fire which signalled Alan Sparhawk's discovery of the distortion pedal, opens the encore.
They might be living up to the billing as a bona fide rock band these days, but that doesn't stop Sparhawk introducing new single 'California' as being about his mother. Although the band seem jovial on stage - they laugh about Sparhawk and drummer Mimi Parker's kid dancing around to the first Napalm Death record in the empty venue earlier in the evening - the reflective and heart-meltingly sad moments are still there, buried in the middle of singalong set-closer 'Broadway (So Many People)' in the enigmatic line "Where is the laughter?".
They also still have that uncanny knack of making the hairs on the back of your neck stand stiff to attention. Sparhawk's nakedly solo rendition of 'Death Of A Salesman' is something truly special, but Parker is not to be outdone and her astonishingly clear vocals make the hushed 'Laser Beam' one of the night's highlights, along with 'When I Go Deaf', which begins in near-silence before exploding into life with squalling guitar to die for.
So, no 'Canada', nothing from Secret Name, and not quite the Damascene experience of two years ago, but still a very strong early frontrunner for SWSL Gig Of The Year.
Setlist (as far as my alcohol-blurred memory and knowledge of Low's material will allow: ? / 'Monkey' / 'California' / '(That's How You Sing) Amazing Grace' / 'Death Of A Salesman' / ? / 'Walk Into The Sea' (acoustic) / 'Pissing' / 'Everybody's Song' / ? / 'Laser Beam' / 'Broadway (So Many People)' // 'Dinosaur Act' / 'Sunflower' / 'When I Go Deaf' /// 'Words'
Links:
Ian Mathers reviews The Great Destroyer for Stylus.
Pitchfork and Splendid review Kid Dakota's The West Is The Future.
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