London Astoria, 21/12/05 Gig Review

Solstice Daze : London Astoria, 21st December 2005

At last, I finally manage to get to a Hawkwind Christmas gig...

Spacehead opened proceedings with some good swoopy synthy space noises over a backing that is not my cup of tea, but they were still preferable to Man – who Mike Holmes pointed out should be more properly called Son Of Man given the youthfulness of the membership (only Martin Ace remaining of the original generation). They provided 45 minutes of pedestrian hard rock / blues, which went down well with an appreciable portion of the audience.

Hawkwind came on at 9.05pm and went straight into a teasing introductory motif featuring the Lord Of Light chord sequence, only to cut over to The Right Stuff. The sound was clear but not quite loud enough in the seated area up top. This number featured a new melodic interlude based on an inversion of the familiar 2-chord pattern before sliding back into the pounding main riff, but was otherwise as we’ve come to expect. And then a mystery guest took the stage for Sword Of The East; none other than Jez Huggett, plus the male Puck and female fairy first seen at the 2003 Hawkfest, during the relative short and focussed trancey midsection that I’d not heard before.

Greenback Massacre which is next up, is interesting for the way the band run with the unusual time signature, which I’d thought was 9/8 when listening to the studio version on Take Me To Your Leader, but is more like 5/4 at this point in the proceedings. I notice Jason Stuart bobbing away behind his keyboards – it’s the first time I’ve seen him live with the band and his buoyancy shows his evident enthusiasm which I’m not yet entirely sharing. Perhaps the acoustics of the venue are responsible, but what I am hearing is not as interesting as the visual spectacle – even without being

able to see the lightshow properly due to an obscured view…

Next we get the minor strummed guitar chords that herald the inclusion of 7 By 7. It’s given a swinging, jazzy feeling despite Alan Davey’s religious observance of the correct Lemmy bassline. Mr.Dibs does the spoken interlude and his sonorous tones are just right for this. The Captain then follows this up with a brief, searing guitar solo, which I can’t swear is the first of many, but his guitar playing is an absolute revelation throughout the set. Jason’s joining the band seems to me to have a invigorating effect on Mr.Brock, pushing Dave from the right-hand side of the stage to the centre, and turning him away from the bedspread-shrouded banks of synths behind which he lurked for most of the 90’s and 00’s. Jason himself is also a tremendous asset to the band in terms of musical prowess – and rather like Steve Swindells in an earlier incarnation of Hawkwind, is a bona fide keyboards player as opposed to a synthesizer operator.

Left: our view of the lightshow was fairly well obscured...

Out Here We Are features a new hippy girl dancer in the vein of Julie Murray (who was on the 1990 Live Legends video). There is also some seemingly live sax from Jez Huggett, though I was sure that it failed to touch his lips at one point near the end of his mid-song solo. He stays on stage for Angela Android, which features another dance innovation with a male / female pairing which I think captures my attention because where I’m sitting the sound is missing some layers – no punishing bass, for example…

For Love In Space the female android backdrops are illuminated in cobalt blue, and Alan Davey pumps a real Ricky sound from his bass to offset the gorgeous vocal melodies. The Hawkfest fairy does a turn unaccompanied as the Captain lets rip with another acid-laced guitar solo. Mr.Dibs comes back out to handle lead vocals on Lord Of Light and does it

splendidly with only the bizarrely costumed male dancer letting the side down. This version is definitely a cut above the 1995 tour soundcheck. But the crowd, it seems to me, is not going bananas, and a quick check over the balcony shows those down the front are no more animated than the rest of the audience at this stage.

Paradox has the trio to the fore with a Dave / Alan vocal duet to introduce the main part of this number, which settles into yet more lead guitar – DB is really going for it tonight. This seems to be everyone’s favourite track judging by the huge cheer it gets. It’s followed by a Spirit Of The Age which has reverted to a “Live 79” arrangement of syncopated riffing. The crowd roar along with the lyrics, as the atmosphere noticeably intensifies during this middle part of the set. By the end of the first vocal passage it all lets rip,

including Dave’s lead guitar, before returning to the more muted rendition of the second verse. This whole pattern is repeated, with what must be at least three heavy duty guitar solos from Dave Brock.

Psi Power contrasts Richard Chadwick’s intonations low in the mix with a dominant dual lead vocal from Davey and Brock, over a quiet keyboard’s descending chord progression. Again, the arrangement is to keep it quiet on the verses and louder on the chorus. This

one really cooks by the time the band get to the end of the song, and they then launch into a blistering knock-em-dead version of Hassan-i-Sahba. What a shame that it includes the Space Is Their Palestine interlude, which turns into the Jez Huggett show, and is also something of a dance special, featuring an Angels and Demons motif that fairly swiftly degenerates into an experience akin to watching a tank full of puffer fish goggle about aimlessly for ten minutes. The “it is written” coda is illuminated by back-of-stage footlights that resemble one bar electric fires. In terms of dancers and stage lighting this could be lifted from the 1986 Chaos tour video…

Alan announces they’re going to do the “Upside Down” version of Brainstorm, and this is exactly what we get. It’s somewhat thrashy and simplistic, introduced with a new chord progression (A-B-C-B-A-C-B?) It seems to end and segue straight into a fast, punky Upside Down with Mr.Dibs on vocals again. This then reconnects to the “is he dead / where’s his head” part of Brainstorm. The crowd down the front are more animated now, but one still gets the feeling that the audience are so laidback with Christmas cheer as to be stunned into immobility by the efficient, blasting band up on stage. And it’s the end of the main part of the set, too…

The band comes back on and Kris Tait introduces Matthew Wright – who himself announces Rob Ayling of Voiceprint, who’s here to give an award to each member of the band for the “phenomenal sales” of Take Me To Your Leader. Amid all this Martin Griffin pops up on stage and presents a similar award to Matthew Wright. After all this presenting it’s a relief

when the band get back to the important business of pushing out a blanga-rich blasting Psychedelic Warlords. The light show is dominated by white stage lights, and the whole thing is ratcheted up to the bouncy finale provided by Brainbox Pollution, where they absolutely pull out all the stops, with everybody on stage, including Keef Barton from Spacehead, Mr.Dibs and Jez Huggett. There’s so much thrumming musical power flowing from the stage that the drums are pretty much drowned out and there’s no way that the set can continue on past this song – anything more could only be an anticlimax, and the band go off to

tumultuous acclaim, having pulled off yet another ripping tour de force of a gig.

I dare say that where I sat had an impact on my enjoyment of this gig (I was looking after someone on crutches who couldn’t stand or get trodden on) but even so, it did seem to start slowly and gradually build up steam. For my money the set really came to life during Psi Power – rather later in proceedings than I would have hoped, but the rabbit was pulled out of the hat once again, and I shuffled out in the usual state of stunned euphoria that only a great Hawkwind gig can provide.