Tueday 19/04/05 Tom Vek, Clor, Keith @ The Social, Nottingham

The implausibly young looking Keith play a set of brooding Elbow-esqe angst anthems that do little to belie their native Manchester. Their impressive use of bongos, cowbells, and discordant piano somewhat make up for their distinct lack of stage presence. Lead singer and keyboardist Oli Bayston, although looking like a rabbit caught in the headlights throughout, has a soaring voice that could match Matt Bellamy for sincerity. However, with so many bands citing Joy Division and early 80s post punk as an influence right now, you find it hard to see what would make Keith stand out from the crowd. Tonight whilst they occasionally stumble upon an infectious groove, the packed out Social ultimately grow a little restless. The four-piece are just about redeemed by set closer ‘Mona Lisa’s Child’ which despite some quite cringe-worthy pretentious sixth form lyrics, has the danceable rhythmic aptitude of early Stone Roses.  

With a combined age probably in excess of 200, the hotly touted Clor arrive on stage looking like they have just arrived from a science teacher’s convention. In front of a backdrop of tall neon lights and a giant video screen showing cream being squirted they tear into set opener ‘Good Stuff’ recalling a thousand different bands at the same time whilst simultaneously sounding like nothing you have ever heard before. A mixture of keyboards, synths and cheesy 80s guitar effects melded with disco drums and bass lines, their distinctive twisted technicolour disco pop goes down an absolute storm. There is an element of The Cardiacs mix of prog and punk combined with The Fiery Furnaces talent for squeezing ten great pop songs into one. Whilst ‘Making You All Mine’ sounds worrying similar to Electric Six, forthcoming single ‘Love and Pain’ is a glorious cross between the soundtrack to a Sinclair Spectrum arcade game and Frankie Goes to Hollywood. Even better, they match this sonic assault whilst managing to look like their barely even trying. Effortlessly brilliant.

After keeping fans waiting for some time, a bespectacled Tom Vek greets the crowd with an apology - his status as potential geek-rock god assured. On this, the opening night of his first major headlining tour, it seems to take the Londoner and his assembled band of virtuoso musicians a while to warm up. ‘C-C (You Set the Fire in Me)’ kicks things off perfectly, all ascending bass lines and 60s organ sounds. But a few too many songs mid-set seem to follow the angular funk-punk blueprint without ever exciting too much and at times sound a little too derivative. Vek does have an eccentric charm that keeps a very enthusiastic crowd captivated. During ‘Nothing But Green Lights’, a superb rip-off of Talking Heads’ ‘Once in a Lifetime’, he knowingly starts dancing like David Byrne. Given another album’s worth of material he could achieve the greatness that set closer ‘I Aint Saying My Goodbyes’ hints at. Live, it sounds euphoric and easily surpasses the recorded version with some truly gargantuan drumming and leaves the dancing crowd breathless with delight.