Wednesday 21/03/07 The Rakes, The Holloways, Love Is All @ QMU, Glasgow

At times, being in a band must be soul destroying. Especially when you’re a support band, playing to a deserted venue, on stage almost as soon as the doors open and playing to a crowd more concerned with their first drink than the music. Such was the predicament facing Swedish five piece Love Is All. “I like this place, it has a nice echo” quips permanently perky front woman Josephine before the band ripped into a set  of snappy punk funk. While on record Love Is All’s sound can perhaps be too cluttered, live everything falls into place. The ramshackle nature of the band works to their credit, with groove heavy tracks being blasted out non stop. Saxophonist Fredrik infuses the band with a soulful touch, though the same cannot be said for his comically bad dancing, which give the impression he’s going to fall over. Luckily, the band keep standing and head off stage with the audience realising they’ve had a real treat.

While Love Is All are mainly (and sadly) unknown, The Holloways are established enough that they’re headlining this venue in two months time. ’So This Is Great Britain’ quickly got a small hardcore following bouncing around, though the majority of the crowd remained statuesque. For all The Holloways energy and admirable stoicism in the face of a variety of technical problems, the reality is that they’re not a great band. The closing double punch of the chirpy ska of ’Generator’ and the messy ’**** Ups’ was great, tunes that even the most hard hearted person will smile at, dance to and pogo to. If only the earlier portion of the set had been as good. Instead, a parade of tedious by-the-numbers material was produced, horribly generic stuff that all merges together. The Holloways may be a rising band but this showing  suggests promotion to the big leagues could be beyond them.