Live From The Fort – 28 March 2009

Chatham’s Fort Amherst is Britain’s largest surviving Napoleonic fortress, built during the middle of the Eighteenth Century to protect the town’s naval dockyards against French invasion. It’s also a wicked gig venue. I went to a previous Live At The Fort event last September while not feeling 100%, so was looking forward to seeing it again with fresh eyes.

Slap Alice was the first act of the night on the acoustic stage. Having followed the progress of her solo career with interest since she first mentioned demoing some self-penned songs last Autumn, this was the first time I’d seen her playing her own material live. She didn’t disappoint. She’s a strong, confident performer with a superb and distinctive voice.
I enjoyed the whole set, but one song in particular called Perfect Cadence was in different league: a delicate, measured, almost gospel-like number with a melancholy country air. She was disappointed with her performance, but I thought she was being a little too self-critical. To be flawed is to be human and perfection is so utterly far from the point.

Burn Paper Tigers’ set on the main stage was similarly flawed. I missed its first half due to timing ineptitude, but I gather it was blighted by electrical problems. By the time I got there, the Tigers’ cage had been well and truly rattled. A fierce, angry version of closing song Blankets was concluded with Driver hurling his bass across the stage. The noise was awesome.
What struck me most about the half of their set that I managed to see was its energy and scale. This was the largest venue I’ve seen them play in and it sounded more like there were five people on stage than three. They’re starting to play more gigs in London now and there’s a general sense of momentum and progress surrounding them, which is great to see.

Lupen Crook played a solo set on the acoustic stage, dipping into a mostly different selection of material to the set that had been honed to perfection by the Murderbirds a couple of months previously. A couple of songs that I hadn’t heard before, a handful of numbers from the band’s set and the reappearance of stuff from last year. Burning, as ever. Kid on fire indeed.

This venue could have been made for Up-C Down-C. Its cavernous scale provided the perfect setting for their euphoric, inverted chasm of noise. I burbled drunkenly afterwards about how I’d have to avoid using the phrase “sonic cathedrals of sound” when writing this review, but thankfully that won’t be necessary. Collapsing marble obelisks should cover it instead.
Up-C Down-C’s music does strange things to my head. At this volume and intensity, the strangeness is off the scale. The sound wraps around me, seems to be coming at me from all directions – and not just because of this particular venue’s acoustics. It burrows into my skull, invoking images of choirs of avenging angels, faces melting like waxworks in the sun.
It was, frankly, fucking marvellous. The more times I encounter them playing live, the less sure I am of exactly what their genre is. Originally I had them down as a kind of pastoral math-rock, but now I’m starting to see them more as cheat-code peers to My Bloody Valentine. They have that same mixture of beauty and brutality, primal screams and ecstatic sighs.
Also playing, but unfortunately none of whom I saw, were Let Our Enemies Beware, Mexico Fallz, Floors And Walls, Scott Brunger and James Doyle. It was yet another night that highlighted for me the distinctive and original quality of the music currently emanating from the Medway Towns, set in a unique and compelling physical and geographical context.
Photographs by Phil Dillon, used with kind permission. More on Flickr and at www.phildillon.co.uk.