Live Music Reviews: The Horrors @ Corner Hotel

The Horrors were once the band everyone loved to hate – especially shoe throwing Arctic Monkey fans on the tour they played together. Have no fear though, Alex always loved them and told sections of his own fans they were devoid of taste for chucking stuff. Cool, eh? Now they are everyone’s favourite band to love and it all happened in the space of two albums – parts of their debut, Strange House, sounded like you were at the mercy of that nasty bloke from the Saw films whereas their next effort Primary Colours bagged them album of the year in the NME and a Mercury Music Prize nomination.

Photographer: Gem Bowles, Same Teens

Where do we stand you might ask yourselves? Well, we always kinda loved them – it’s like we grew up with them. Not in the same house or anything, there would be too many fights over the hairspray, but we were all going to our first gigs when they started and their sheer passion and coolness had us hooked. Then we grew up and started listening to stuff like Krautrock, and even Northern Soul, and it seems with their last album so did they.

Photographer: Gem Bowles, Same Teens

Same Teens has got outposts in places like Japan and Australia too and when bands go over there we try to fix up our lot with tickets and photo passes and bands are always keen to help us out. It doesn’t always go according to plan but we’re pretty resilient where ever we are in the world.

Here’s what our girls Emma and Anna got up to in Melbourne – yeah, the one in Australia….

The Horrors @ Corner Hotel, Melbourne

27^th January 2010

It wasn’t certain that we were going to get into this gig – not only due to being rebellious underage fake ID holding teens, but because we were ticket-less, and relying on a text message to be received by Horrors guitarist Joshua Von Grimm from our good friend Nick from Same Teens in time to secure us a spot on the guest list. Hey, there was no harm in trying! Luckily enough after around half an hour of desperately holding onto the remains of hope left in us, once realising our names weren’t on the list the lovely tour manager informed us Josh had only just turned on his phone for the first time in three weeks…and so we soon found ourselves deep in a mass of teased hair, winkle-pickers, and sets of mind-bogglingly skinny pins.

Fabulous Diamonds provided a tantalising start to the evening with their shoegazer, experimental noise tunes, thoroughly impressing the excited audience wooed by some shrill sounding synths and steadily pounding drums, leaving the audience’s blood pulsing in preparation for The Horrors.

The five porcelain skinned members casually graced the stage, greeting the sold-out Corner band room bursting with energized admirers and shooting straight into the set with Primary Colours album opener ‘Mirror’s Image’. I only manage to catch the occasional glance at the outlandishly attractive band members in between having to settle for either watching the colourful lights’ reflection on the roof or the scapula or the mohawked man in front of me, but from the images I was able to catch, it’s front man Farris Badwan’s wide, black eyes that stand out in particular. Lifeless they appear, but the energy that surges through his droning vocals and shrill screams shows quite the opposite. Josh’s eyes are never to be seen behind his thick black fringe that hangs over his face looking down at his guitar that, along with the dense bass and rich synths, aids in making me feel the music in my throat. I find myself even wondering if it were actually possible that my head might explode right there in the middle of the crowd…

The main part of the Horrors’ set is occupied by almost every song off their second album, providing for a debauched, brutal sound that proves the band name suits perfectly. Songs like ‘I Only Think of You’, ‘New Ice Age’ and title track ‘Primary Colours’ are well received, every member of the crowd finding themselves getting more and more lost in the trance-like state emitted from the music. The band members leave the stage fully aware the audience will beg for more. We do so, and soon enough, they waltz back to their positions and play older tracks like ‘Sheena is a Parasite’ and ‘Count in Fives’, much to the audiences’ delight. The older, more thrash-punk tracks complete a severely satisfying set, leaving devotees in absolute awe and cementing a position in what were once half-in-love fans’ hearts and minds.

And trust me; I’m not only delivering this praise because I may be a little bit attracted to those high cheek-boned, well-groomed men. The Horrors are simplistic yet multi-dimensional, and present a set dripping with energy and drive, packing quite the punch.

Words by Emma Shields, Same Teens

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View our great deals on music from The Horrors at zavvi.com.

If you like The Horrors then check out  The Sonics who they supported when they reformed for some special gigs . You might also like 60s Garage, psyche and Krautrock might be right up your street too.

Joshua Von Grimm recommended Analogue Bubblebath by AFX – a pseudonym of Richard James AKA Aphex Twin – and we weren’t disappointed!

So, what do you think of The Horrors? Are they destined for big things?