AMBER ARCADES

AMBER ARCADES/HATER/THALA AT JOINERS ARMS, SOUTHAMPTON – 30/01/23

Life is funny, isn’t it? A few weeks ago I hadn’t been to the JOINERS ARMS for twenty-seven or twenty-eight years and now I find myself here for the second time this month. Another funny thing is that when I came here a few weeks ago I found the place without any trouble at all, but this time I get hopelessly, bafflingly lost. I ended up driving the wrong way down a one-way street, like the Tindersticks song, and realise that this is pretty much a metaphor for my life right now. I still don’t really know where I went wrong. I think I thought I knew the way and I got cocky, which is a lesson for us all really, especially for me: don’t get cocky. 

I stand on the opposite side of the stage this time, because that’s just the kind of guy I am. I like to mix things up. I’m standing at the front as usual and as soon as the music starts find myself surrounded by photographers. Quite a pushy bunch, these photographers. They don’t have much regard for personal space, let me tell you.

THALA seems to have it all: looks, talent, confidence, songs, shiny expensive-looking guitars, perfect teeth, a midriff, etc. She has the vibe of someone who’s going places. Someone for whom “making it” is just a matter of time and turning up. This is her first UK show, but along with her musical partner – a man who when he’s really getting into the music makes those faces like he’s fucking someone from behind or masturbating vigorously – seems to know exactly what she’s doing. It sounds like the kind of music you used to hear in the background of Home and Away or Buffy the Vampire Slayer, or other shows that featured teenage characters. Apparently, all the songs are “sad” because she “used to be sad”. One of the quite endearing things about her is that she fills the silence in between songs by offering a sort of running commentary on what’s happening. “I’m having a lot of fun,” she says, and “I need a drink of water,” and “I’m just going to do a little switcheroo,” when she swaps a shiny electric guitar for a shiny acoustic. I’m excited for her. I hope she makes it. She might be Taylor Swift one day.

Used to be sad

I can’t really think of anything much to say about HATER, except that they’re quite good, and the drummer reminds me of Ray Manzarek but probably only because he’s wearing the same kind of rounded metallic spectacles that Kyle MacLachlan wears in The Doors movie, and the singer’s leather trousers remind me that earlier today a student told me that I looked like a rock star, which is the first time anyone’s ever said anything like that to me. I notice that guitar players these days seem to have an awful lot of pedals. I mean I’m sure they always did have a fair few but they seem to have proliferated in recent times, if tonight’s gig is any measure. There have probably been more pedals than people here tonight, which is not to say that the show is sparsely attended – the audience is at least respectable for a Monday night in January – just that there really are an awful lot of pedals being used. I can’t help but feel that they can’t all be entirely necessary.

Lots of pedals

AMBER ARCADES are all cool sophistication and sleek professionalism, with all their gear and shiny guitars, and earphones tucked discreetly in ears with wires stealthily creeping down their backs beneath their clothes, and leather trousers again (I wonder how you wash leather trousers, and I wonder if maybe they just have loads of pairs so they don’t need to wash them), and pedals of course, loads of pedals, more pedals than people. The guitarist has one of those specially made boards so that he can move all his pedals around easily, and spends much of the gig crouching down turning little knobs this way and that, while the bass player spends a good few minutes before the gig taping everything down so it stays exactly where it is. Bands nowadays, I think, really know what they’re doing; they’ve really got their shit sorted. There’s no mucking about, like there used to be, and it makes me a little nostalgic for all the mucking about, when bands really didn’t have a clue what was going on, and hardly even seemed to be fully conscious a lot of the time. The bass player seems like a fun guy. The way he throws his bass around onstage reminds me a little of one of those rodeo riders you get in America, but with a kind of erotic twist, and the sound of his bass I can only describe as “monster bass”. It doesn’t seem to fit somehow, but it works just fine. Anyway, the music is flawless, and the new songs sound great. If their album was available on cassette I’d definitely buy it, but I just don’t feel like spending twenty-five quid on vinyl these days. “Thanks for coming out on a Monday in January and supporting independent venues,” says Annelotte de Graaf, the singer. “That’s pretty cool.”

Crouching with pedals