Tag Archive for 'forward russia'

¡Forward, Russia! – B-Sides, Live Recordings and Other Things…

Published on January 26, 2010 in Music. 0 Comments Tags: , .

Just a quick note for any ¡Forward, Russia! fans still lurking around these parts. The band have started putting up some recordings on their forum. I already had everything that’s up so far, but it served as a good reminder of how enjoyable a lot of these live recordings are. Hopefully there’ll be more to come over time.

¡Forward, Russia! are still undoubtedly my favourite band and it’s good to see that things aren’t completely quiet on that front. Though a number of the members of the band have been involved in various things which I’m going to be talking about soon, so that’s a positive.

Russians Have A Kit Kat

Published on August 13, 2008 in Music. 8 Comments Tags: , .

In news that left me feeling more than a little gutted earlier today, ¡Forward, Russia! announced that after their next gig they’re going to take a break from doing things for the immediate future. The full statement is available here, but the band have been at pains to stress that they are not splitting up. This has naturally made their single gig in Leeds a must for me. Given the date I reckon I’ll just make that a birthday present to myself.

Back to the announcement though, it really did sadden me. It does make sense though, given that the last I heard Rob (bassist) had a full time job and the statement says that Katie (drummer) is going to do an art course in Nottingham.  Tom (singer) has been producing mainly for a band called Minnaars and that all sounds quite interesting. As ever Whiskas appears to have been doing a variety of things. Check out his blog. (Nyevsky Prospect in the sidebar ;) ) Still it’s not hard to feel a little bit upset at the news. The lack of ¡Forward, Russia! gigging and releasing music for the foreseeable future will certainly leave a largish gap in my musical life.

As I’ve already talked about here, this year has not been a good one for bands I like. They all seem to be splitting up, or putting things on the back burner for a bit. Still at least this ¡Forward, Russia! seem to just be taking a break. Tom put it quite well I think when he said on the forums that At The Drive-In went on indefinite hiatus, whereas ¡Forward, Russia! are doing somehting more like My Bloody Valentine. Still, I hope it doesn’t take 10 years for any new activity.

I guess there’s nothing more to do other than to celebrate the two excellent albums they’ve released to date, a multitude of fantastic gigs that I’ve witnessed (well over 20, maybe 30…I lost count) and look forward to hearing more in the future.

¡Forward, Russia! Live at Fat Sams, Dundee, April 17th 2008

Published on April 18, 2008 in Music, gig and review. 2 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , .

I think its fair to say that Fat Sams is quite a different place than King Tuts. While I don’t quite share the opinion that King Tuts is the best live music venue there is, it certainly comes close. Fat Sams? Well, it’s a club. This immediately alters the mood, the bouncers have inflated egos, the atmospher is generally a bit worse. This wasn’t helped by the fact that it’s a club in Dundee. So far as I can tell Dundee doesn’t have quite the same music scene as somewhere like Edinburgh or Glasgow. In Edinburgh and Glasgow people go out to gigs fairly regularly, at least some people do, in Dundee this is not the case. People go to gigs to see local bands in Dundee.

Speaking of which, the local band that opened last night were terrible. I actually had to leave the room a couple of times because the music was so poorly conceived. Indeed as someone I was at the gig pointed out, one of their songs didn’t end. This was not in a good way either, for instance on The Mars Volta’s Amputechre many of the songs are literally amputated, this song however meandered on after it should have finished, then suddenly with no warning they stopped playing. There was no feeling that the song had finished. Then there was the awful pairing of Meg White style drumming to a song which didn’t suit it. I like The White Stripes a lot, but Meg’s drumming suits the style of music they play. When you insert that style of drumming into a song that is not in that style, it does not work.

Moving swiftly onwards and back to Johnny Foreigner. Another excellent set from the best thing to come out of Birmingham in along time. Again they played with an energy, and their songs were so dynamic that you couldn’t help but get really in to the set. The inter song banter continued in the same vein as that in Glasgow. This time it was more outrageous though, at one point they apologised for their lack of organisation and proceeded to talk at length about what to play next. When this got a heckle from the crowd the instant response was: “Could you be quiet, we’re trying to have a conversation here!” I think I’m in love with the song they finish on, excellent set finisher. Suffice to say, I will be getting their album when it’s released. Despite their candid admission that they steal music from the internet, so they can’t expect us to buy it. I certainly will be buying it though.

After the band once more walked on to the sounds of That’s Amore, Tom announced that he was having problems with his throat. It’s to his credit that he soldiered on through the performance, especially as the band had to cancel today’s Newcastle date after a reccomendation from a doctor. The band were on fine form again, once more opening with the excellent Spring Is A Condition. The setlist was largely similar to the Glasgow gig, only this time we did actually get A Prospector Can Dream. Unfortunately the technical problems meant that once more Nineteen wasn’t played. This did however mean that Whiskas dedicated Gravity And Heat to me, which was a really excellent thing for him to do.  Again the set took in the epic Don’t Be A Doctor and finished on Spanish Triangles. Spanish Triangles is easily the best finisher I’ve seen, the opportunity for group vocals at the end during the epic guitar, where Bentley the guitar tech comes on stage to play extra guitar, is immense. I was left once more wanting much more and tempted to go to Newcastle, thankfully for me that was cancelled; preventing me from doing something irresponsible.

¡Forward, Russia! Live at King Tuts 15th of April 2008

Published on April 16, 2008 in Music, gig and review. 3 Comments Tags: , , , , , , .

First up a small note on King Tuts itself. This was the first time I’ve been at King Tuts where there was a barrier, and I have to say this disappointed me. Barriers at gigs are always really poorly thought out, I’ve never understood why they don’t pad them. Sure there are practicalities involved with padding them, but it just makes sense. Anybody who has been to a gig will be faimiliar with the idiots who form a mosh pit, and cause general harm to all around. I’ve been in many situations where I’ve been crushed up against a barrier for large parts of gigs, believe me a little padding would go a long way. Anyway, I saved myself the trouble by standing at the front right of the stage, just beyond where the barrier comes to. This gave me a perfect view of the gig, close up but not being crushed and with room to dance.

As always seems to be the case when I visit Glasgow, there was a local band of dubious quality up first. I honestly don’t know how Glasgow generates all these bad local bands, but it does. To be fair top This July, it’s not really that they were bad; mediocre is probably a better description. Beyond the vocals, I couldn’t quite put my finger on what was wrong. To me it just seemed that they played a number of poorly conceived songs, lacking in any real hooks or personality. Again they had the local Glasgow audience lapping up the Glaswegian band, something I find happening only in Glasgow really. At one point between songs I said to my friends: “Please say this is going to be your last song.” Fortunately, this is exactly what the frontman said not 5 seconds later.

On to the main support act and I had plenty of confidence that we were going to be in for more of a treat. Even before Johnny Foreigner came on stage, I was pleased by their cute riff on the ghosts from Pacman accross most of their equipment. To say that I was impressed is an understatement. Their songs were infectious, with excellent interplay between drums, bass, guitar and ocassionally synth. For a band with only three members their sound was full and pleasing, no doubt helped by the boy girl tennis volley vocals. I was sad when their set finished, despite the fact that meant ¡Forward, Russia! would be on soon. Clearly they were good then.

So to ¡Forward, Russia! who had just released their excellent second album Life Processes (review to come later) the day before. This meant they had to tread the careful line between playing the newer songs, and the older ones. Personally I could’ve done with more of the new songs. Particularly when their technical gizmos went on the fritz taking both A Prospector Can Dream and Nineteen out of the setlist. These were replaced by Seven and Nine, two songs I love, but having seen the live so many times I couldn’t feel a little bit upset that the other two couldn’t be played. Opening with Spring Is A Condition was a masterstroke, for so long I can only remember ¡Forward, Russia! starting with Thirteen, even though the eventually migrated away from it, it was still nice to see it placed in the middle with a new perfect opener in place. For me the highlights were very definitely the new songs, in addition to Spring Is A Condition, Don’t Reinvent What You Don’t Understand, Gravity and Heat, and A Shadow Is A Shadow Is A Shadow were awesome to experience live. Gracity and Heat in particular was anthemic and truly felt like as much of an instant classic as Don’t Be A Doctor was.

¡Forward, Russia! are a band who have very much improved in almost every imaginable way since their debut album. Give Me A Wall was an extremely important album to me, but the band as a whole just seem so much more confident now, particularly playing the newer songs. Older songs are re-invigorated as well, which can only be a good thing. While they may be confident playing, Katie did take time to say that she wasn’t sure anybody would turn up. I guess it’s always a worry, but a band of such quality should never have to worry about that. The set finished with the epic Spanish Triangles, which is an even better set finisher than Eleven was back in the Give Me A Wall days. The way the song builds to the oh so singable refrain of “Turn your ships around, we are all armadas now,” truly astounds live. The band have to get credit for being willing to involve guitar tech Bentley in playing on Spanish Triangles, it helps keep it as brilliantly layered as it is on the album. We were even treated to an encore which is a relative rarity for ¡Forward, Russia!, though they may end up playing them more often now them seem to be more popular. Fifteen Part II was the song chosen, which is an excellent song for an encore, though again personally I’d have loved to see something newer. I understand that’s not how encores work though.

So an excellent gig, which left me angry at myself for not having sorted out a way for going to the Aberdeen gig. I would rate ¡Forward, Russia! as being at their absoloute best since I started going to see them live back in 2005, and Johnny Foreigner were an excellent bonus. Still, I have Dundee to look forward to. Though I can’t imagine the acoustics are very good in Fat Sams…

¡Forward, Russia! Track By Track Video

Published on April 8, 2008 in Music. 4 Comments Tags: , , .

¡Forward, Russia! have released a track by track video talk-through of their new album Life Processes, which can be found at Last.FM. I found the roughly twenty five minute long video to be both interesting and offer some insight into the album and the recording process. For your viewing pleasure I’ve embedded the clip below.