Live reviews

Mudhoney + Holy Soul - May 15th, Vega

I hadn't planned this monday to end with drinking white russians till the next morning with Rocco Woodrose at some bar in Vesterbro after hanging out backstage with Mudhoney, but somehow it seemed fitting to seriously celebrate one of the greatest rock'n'roll shows this year.

First up were Sidney rockers Holy Soul, a fresh young combo greatly influenced by the likes of Beasts Of Bourbon and Gun Club. Fronted by a Carrot Top-looking redhead sporting the biggest set of pearly choppers I've seen in years, Holy Soul delivered some great tunes like "Sign Of The Triangle", "Psychotic Notions (You, Baby)", and since they're Aussie also a song about Princess Mary (or they claim), "Mary's Tainted Lemonade"). Some dork kept screaming for "Touch Me I'm Sick" during the set, but the lads just laughed it off.

It's been 14 odds years since I saw Mudhoney on a stage, tonite would the 4th time I caught 'em, and I must say they were even better than their 1992 show in Copenhagen, only their 1989 show was superior to this fuzz fest. The boys might be middle aged men by now, but from the get go of "Suck You Dry" I was sucked into a maelstrom of sonic infusion (as one of the titles of tonite's set, and one of the best songs). By "You Got it" the packed club went haywire, and the stagediving and crowdsurfing began. Two sludgy songs off the new "Under A Billion Suns" records, "Where Is the Future" and "Hard-On For War", dragged the tempo down, and speakers almost exploded in a loud hypnotic wall of fuzz, which later got a reprise with "Beneath Valley Of The Underdog", pure delirium. I was more than delighted to hear old faves like "Sweet Young Thing", "Touch Me I'm Sick", "Here Comes Sickness" (I popped a boner!) and damned if they didn't play "In'n'OutGrace" during the encores. I saw Martin of Kussekannibalerne stagediving during the last song, the Dicks' "Hate The Police", so I guess a lot of the younger generation enjoyed this excellent show as much as I did. Mark Arm and Steve Turner weren't into kissing the audience's ass with any banter, they were just focused like fuckin' ninjas on the deadly task of rockin' their behinds off. It was the first time I've seen Guy Maddison in the lineup, and he was amazing on the bass, as were ol' Dan on skins'n'sticks. All in all, FUCKIN' OUTSTANDING!!! See interview elsewhere in this issue

Holy Soul:
Mudhoney:

Jens