Photo: Gigwise
On record Honeyblood feel a little shiny and produced, so one arrives at Oslo prepared for an enjoyable evening of nice, girly guitar-pop. Don’t you just love it when you’re proved wrong?
The girls kick off with ‘Fall Forever’ - a fairly pretty and delicate number on record, but tonight vocalist Stina Tweeddale sounds like a grungier Gwen Stefani circa ‘96 – doll-like and pouty – and suddenly we're cruising through the Clueless soundtrack, top down, with the sun on our shoulders. Sexy? Yes. Polished? No.
On moody ‘(I’d Rather Be) Anywhere But Here’ Tweeddale changes lanes, channelling early Courtney Love (the best kind): all scowling, drawling drawn-out vowels and louche nasal tones. It is Tweeddale’s vocal that takes centre stage tonight, but ‘Bud’ with its folksy harmonies and flat, childlike high-hat shows off the girls as an engaging duo, echoing fellow-Glaswegians, The Vaselines.
"So here we are,” muses Tweeddale,“It's kind of a big deal for us, don't tell anyone..." Their secret’s safe with us. ‘Fortune Cookie’ ends with some distinctly un-ladylike yelling, and Cat Myers on drums demands dancing to ‘All Dagged Up’, with Tweeddale rasping and spitting her scornful refrain – “Why won’t you grow up” – but the bad girl act isn’t fooling anyone: the track closes with a sweet dedication, "to Bradley ‘cos it's his birthday. May you never grow up Bradley!"
The positive vibes continue as Tweeddale tells us, "I know it's cheesy ‘n’ shit, but thanks you guys," before closing with ‘Killer Bangs’, taking us straight back to that convertible in California, and it’s like a million teenage riot-grrrl hearts, all beating at once.
