PUSSYLIQUOR + THE DAMN SHEBANG + TOKYO HONEY TRAP + WIMP – THE HOPE & RUIN, BRIGHTON 31.7.23
Before the all conquering escapades of Lambrini Girls, there was Pussyliquor, who were proudly flying the flag for uncensored female rage on the Brighton punk/riot grrrl scene. Well folks I’m over the moon to inform you all that…Pussyliquor are back! To paraphrase them “U thought we was dead but pussys got 9 lives”.
The lineup still features Ari Black (vocals), Victoria Lewis Piper (drums), Hannah Villanueva (Fender guitar) and Tallulah Turner-Fray (Fender bass), who originally met up via their degree courses with Access To Music Brighton and bonded over a passion for hard-core music and even harder core feminist beliefs.
The band are all in their early twenties and they have the no-nonsense and in your face approach that recalls the spirit and energy of Cosey Fanni Tutti, L7 and The Slits. Together they’re fighting a cause and celebrating what it means to be a woman.
In the past, Pussyliquor were special guests of Dream Wife for their ‘sold out’ London show at Heaven and also played a run of shows with Lady Bird, as well as a hometown appearance at the launch party of ‘The Great Escape’ festival a few years back.
The quartet are revitalised and back at it and they announced a couple of comeback concerts. The first being a sold out show at the Paper Dress Vintage in London on 29th July, and the second being this evening’s maximum capacity show in Queens Road at The Hope & Ruin. There was a trio of support acts in action tonight, but we will come to them shortly. First up then it’s Pussyliquor…
The quartet took to the stage at 10:16pm and for the next forty minutes (until 10:56pm), they and an additional (male) guitarist JJ Symon from The Damn Shebang set the world to rights. First up though was a team meeting on stage to decide what they are going to play for us! What?! That’s a bit late isn’t it? Turns out that this slight delay would arguably end up costing them the opportunity of an encore track, possibly ‘Lady W*nk’ at the end. Also there was to be no ‘Get Out’ which is my favourite Pussyliquor track. Right, that’s the moaning out of the way, let’s get down to the review…
The outfit begins with their shouty ‘C.*.N.T’ anthem, which almost from the off saw singer Ari throw herself to the floor. ‘Pretty Good For A Girl’ followed and I can wholeheartedly confirm at this point that they sounded as good as they used to be pre-Covid, if not better! The catchy ‘Hurtz’ with its “‘cos you only like to” chorus speedily followed. For this track, Ari joined the punters in the crowd for some dance/mosh action.
As indicated by Hannah with her “meow meow” before tune four, this could only mean that it was to be ‘Kitty Kitty’ that was coming up next. After this, Ari informed us that there was to be a “new song” and then didn’t tell us the title. So many artists tend to do this. For the record it’s called ‘Young Love’. I can report that this is a rocky bouncy number that chugged along very nicely and had some decent double guitar riffs in it…very nice, the best tune thus far, and Ari was back in amongst the crowd for this one.
‘Apathy’ was Pussyliquor’s next choice and vocally reminded me of the heaviest parts of X-Ray Spex’s Poly Styrene tracks from back in the day. This track was just as good as its predecessor. ‘Buy More Shit’ was up next and another decent ditty. Then it was surprise time as Ari informs us that “this is a very old tune” and low and behold they launch into Shel Silverstein’s ‘Boa Constrictor’ tune found on his 1962 ‘Inside Folk Songs’ album. I reckon many might know it from Johnny Cash’s 1966 cover from his comedy album ‘Everybody Loves A Nut’. Although I was in the front row, it sounded like they were singing “I’ve been bit by a boa constrictor”, and I was thinking to myself that boa’s normally squeeze you to death instead of biting, but it turns out they bite too! Nature lesson over!
Things got a tad messy next as they announced the arrival of Dead Seany from one of the support bands, who was dressed as a fly and walking around with a large vegan chocolate cake which was meant to represent things that flies hover over and like to eat! Hence ‘Pesticide’ was needed to get rid of him. There was some cake throwing to be had! Their iconic anthem ‘My Body My Choice’ was the closing tune and one which Hannah informs us is to respect people at gigs and not to touch them. The devil got in me and I hugged my chum Steve who was standing next to me. Thankfully he chuckled at this…Phew!
Ari went for a final wander during the tune as well. It had been a truly fantastic night out and fans got 4 bands for their £7, which is very reasonable. Can’t wait for the next Pussyliquor gigs to be announced and hopefully an album.
Pussyliquor:
Ari Black – vocals
Victoria Lewis Piper – drums
Hannah Villanueva – guitar
Tallulah Turner-Fray – bass
Pussyliquor setlist:
‘C.*.N.T’
‘Pretty Good For A Girl’
‘Hurtz’
‘Kitty Kitty’
‘Young Love’??
‘Apathy’
‘Buy More Shit’
‘Boa Constrictor’ (Shel Silverstein cover)
‘Pesticide’
‘My Body My Choice’
The main support for this evening came in the guise of The Damn Shebang who bill themselves as “Brighton’s premiere evil R’n’R band”. Tonight, the quartet of Dead Seany (vocals/keys), JJ Symon (guitar/backing vocals), Lyn Gasper (bass) and Dan Brown (drums) whizzed through no less than eight tunes in their 25 minute set, which runs from 9:36pm to 10:01pm. This wasn’t our first encounter with the band, whose name is stylized to ‘The Dmn Shbng’ as they formed here in town (Brighton) back in 2015.
I noted that this evening Lyn, who is also a member of The Atom Jacks, (see review HERE) was playing a normal 4-string bass, (a Squier Phoenix I think), whereas I have seen her playing a distinctive 6-stringed bass on at least one other occasion. The Damn Shebang is however, very much the lead of vocalist Dead Seany, who is also in charge of the compact Yamaha Reface YC combo organ keyboard. Having said that, the spokesperson in between tunes is JJ Symon on Burns Marquee electric guitar. He introduces most of the tunes, which is most helpful for a reviewer. Drummer Dan Brown also gets his say on his mic at one stage during the set.
Back in 2019 The Damn Shebang dropped their ‘Goths On The Beach’ single, but Goths they are not! This tune gets an outing this evening as track six. Their debut long player ‘Damned If You Don’t’ followed in 2021, a handful of these would be played for us this evening.
Clearly here is a band that are fans of the rock ‘n’ roll trash psychobilly style, especially that of The Cramps and The Birthday Party. This is evident from the very off with the rumbly bass heavy sounds of their Kip Tyler cover ‘She’s My Witch’ as well as ‘Molly’. Vocalist Seany then gets up close and personal for ‘Let’s Get Pleathered’ when he moves forward and stands on the central ground speaker, thus towering over the eager punters. In a few tunes time he would venture further and join the crowd for a decent mosh, no doubt spurred on by members of the Electric Cowboy Club (ECC) who were in attendance.
I particularly enjoyed the retro sounding keys on tune seven, ‘Zodiak Advice Line’. Throughout the set there were twangs aplenty from the guitar and bass, which were supplemented by the keys and drums, and Seany enjoyed offloading his vocals in a meaty style. Their penultimate number was ‘Black Boots’ which signalled the arrival of Pussyliquor’s Ari Black on joint vocals. But having said that, my choice TDS tune was their final number, ‘Be Your Baby’, which just happens to be their fastest and most punky tune and I particularly enjoyed Dan’s drumming on this track.
The Damn Shebang:
Dead Seany – vocals/keys
JJ Symon – guitar/backing vocals
Lyn Gasper – bass
Dan Brown – drums
The Damn Shebang setlist:
‘She’s My Witch’ (Kip Tyler cover)
‘Molly’
‘Black Slack Ripper’
‘Let’s Get Pleathered’
‘Beat It’
‘Goths On The Beach’
‘Zodiak Advice Line’
‘Black Boots’ (with Ari Black)
‘Be Your Baby’
You can next catch The Damn Shebang playing live in Brighton on Thursday 17th August, where they will be appearing at The Prince Albert along with Call Me Franco and also Numskull. Tickets can be purchased HERE.
Let’s simply cut to the chase here…Tokyo Honey Trap are Martin Degville’s ultimate wet dream. It’s as though after 37 years Tokyo Honey Trap have burst out of the cover artwork of Sci-Fi Sex Stars ‘Rockit Miss USA’ / ‘Teenage Thunder’ 12″ vinyl. Sci-Fi Sex Stars being the secret guise of the legendary Sigue Sigue Sputnik.
Standing at the crowd barrier tonight, I was positioned immediately in front of Tokyo Honey Trap band creator (and BIJ Records founder) tetsu nclaren who has certainly been to the Neal X school of rock guitar playing and poses with his Gibson Les Paul with a Bigsby whammy bar (aka tremolo arm). Tetsu informs us that this is the band’s first UK tour. I note it’s called ‘Hyper Minority’ tour and for them has been a nine date jaunt around the country. The first seven were on the bill with the Soap Girls (who we last reviewed in Brighton back in 2018 – Review HERE) and these last two gigs have been with Pussyliquor.
The mood is set as the quartet take to the stage and stand with their backs to us and at the same time an intro tape with blasted out ‘Symphony No.4 First Movement’ by The Japan Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra & Akeo Watanabe. They were the only act of the four that were to use an intro tape. I’m quite a fan of them to be honest, but I guess if you only have an hour hour slot as this one was (running from 8:50pm to 9:20pm) then maybe it’s better to just get on with it?
The format of Tokyo Honey Trap (Tōkyō hanītorappu / 東京ハニートラップ) tonight is vocals; guitar and occasional backing vocals; bass; and drums and a laptop. For me, the contents of the laptop which was controlled by the drummer (Yuta), holds the essential electronic backing sounds and rhythms. They should have been higher in the mix as Sputnik’s were! Mitsu’s vocals were also down in the mix as well, but as they were I believe in Japanese then maybe it didn’t matter. Interestingly mitsu’s setlist was written in Japanese and tetsu were in English.
Clearly these are another manufactured band (Sputnik, The Monkees etc) and one that is desperately trying to trade off the Sex Pistols name. Vocalist mitsu is even wearing a Jamie Reid ‘God Save The Queen’ Pistols style jacket, but back in their native land, Pistols and punk is still very big and they certainly get obsessed with it. My partner Jordan Mooney (RIP) was even invited to go to Japan for several talks about her life and the Pistols. She told me they were very kind people.
Apparently, electro-punks Tokyo Honey Trap have already amassed 20 former band members. Tonight’s assistants were Eli on bass and Yuta on drums, with the hardcore band being solely tetsu and mitsu. I would hazard a guess that they are aiming to raise a revolution with their counter-cultural music of fuzz guitar, fret buzz and feedback.
Tonight they open with ‘Lobotomy’ which has a bouncy beat, as does the following number, their ‘Uri Geller’ single and both are laden with familiar guitar riffs. ‘Tokyo Tower’ is tune three and is littered with a whole host of “la la las” at the end. The final four numbers were ‘Non Policy’, ‘U.T.I,’, ‘Love And Peace’ and latest single ‘Wonderful Looooser’. During this section we learned that Pussyliquor’s Ari Black actually appears on vocals on a couple of tunes that are on THT’s debut album ‘[demo tape]’. Ari is on the chorus of ‘Non Policy’ and ‘U.T.I.’. At one stage, bassist Eli played the instrument over the back of their head for one number, which looked cool. This quartet was fun and went down well with the packed crowd. They certainly rate big enthusiasm and effort.
Tokyo Honey Trap:
Tetsuya Nakagawa (tetsu nclaren) – guitar, bv’s
Mitsu (mitsu nclaren) – vocals
Ellie (Eli) – bass
Yuta – drums
Tokyo Honey Trap setlist:
(Intro tape) ‘Symphony No.4 First Movement’ by The Japan Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra & Akeo Watanabe
‘Lobotomy’
‘Uri Geller’
‘Tokyo Tower’
‘Non Policy’
‘U.T.I.’
‘Love And Peace’
‘Wonderful Looooser’
The opening band at The Hope & Ruin this evening are four guys based in Brighton that collectively go under the banner of Wimp. They are Marley (vocals, guitar), Tommy (bass, vocals), Sammy (guitar) and Arthur (drums, vocals). ELO fans note there is no ‘Horace’. They are currently finishing off an EP at this moment in time and at present aren’t currently splashed all across the internet, which is something that they will have to urgently address in these modern times.
This evening they entertained us for exactly half an hour, from 8:02pm to 8:32pm. In that time they performed eight tunes for us. Although tonight is at maximum 150 capacity, sadly many folk were arriving during the Wimp set. Thus as a result, the longer the quartet played, the bigger the appreciating crowd got and the better they became. If any of this evening’s latecomers are fans of Blink 182, Green Day and Nirvana and missed Wimp, then I’m afraid that you will be kicking yourselves as that’s exactly what Wimp sound like, an amalgam of the three.
The lead vocals are shared between guitarist Marley and bassist Tommy, with Marley holding the majority stake. His vocal style is arguably shouty atop the outfits gritty guitar, chugging bass and attacked drums. Tommy’s vocals are less on the shouty front and possibly more melodic. At one stage, drummer Arthur even has a go on vocals, although his (also shouty style) are a little down in the mix.
The band’s energy is maintained throughout their set and some parts whizz along at normal speed only suddenly for them to go into warp drive and Arthur’s drumming would go 100mph. No wonder he finally had to put the hood down from his sweatshirt that he had over his head. During these speed parts, interestingly, the vocals (especially Marley’s) remained at the same slower scrawled delivery pace. This had been a powerful (punk/grunge) opening act that certainly set the tone for what was to follow.
Wimp:
Marley – vocals, guitar
Tommy – bass, vocals
Sammy – guitar
Arthur – drums, vocals
Wimp setlist:
‘So Soon/Miss You’
‘Drown’
‘Higher Than The High’
‘Untitled’
‘Kiss the world’
‘Arthur’s Song’
‘Malheur’
‘Wimp’
www.instagram.com/simp_for_wimp
