Photo: Press
And just for a moment there - among the swirls of ominous sounds, the throbbing bass and vortex of reverb that sucks all matter into it, before vomiting it all out like an alcoholic unable to hold down a meal - it feels as if the subterranean environs of the 100 Club have become the Devil’s own disco.
Crowd-surfing bodies are carried over ducking heads by outstretched arms with others waiting to join them. The increasing levels of chaos, both on and off the stage, are being driven by the genuinely unhinged reading of ‘Bomb Disneyland’ that’s bringing this show to a close. All at once there is lunacy, disgust and despair, and right now, this is the perfect soundtrack to a world gone mad.
Fat White Family actually feel like the personification of danger and they’re certainly a far more threatening - and ultimately more satisfying - beast on the stage than they are on record. It’s impossible not to think of Hawkwind’s heyday of the first half of the 70s: another band of thoroughly grimy outsiders with a healthy disdain for the straight world who didn’t quite capture that live genie in a bottle.
Like The Fall before them, Fat White Family have long adopted a revolving door policy to their line-up yet the tightness of the playing belies any unsettled shifts. ‘Touch The Leather’ is deliciously sleazy while ‘I Am Mark E. Smith’ doesn’t so much lurch around as offer the venue out the back for a punch up. Yes, it is nasty, it is scuzzy and it does make your skin itch, but if you’re after mere entertainment then this ain’t the place for you.
This is the hard and undiluted stuff. It’s not always easy to swallow but it does make you feel a whole lot better.
