They’re so bloody elusive, New
York’s infamous alt-ethereal duo Joy Zipper, to the point of being a mythical
construct. Crud missed the start of the set (hey, don’t blame us – blame the mad
chap in a wheelchair blocking traffic on Charing Cross Road) but they may as well
have seeped in through the air conditioning system and manifested themselves gently
into human form live there on stage. It helps us to think they have. Their subtle
masterpiece ‘American Whip’ floated around as a promo for a couple of years
before it snuck out amid record company wrangles, under the radar and without
fanfare last year. And as if to reinforce that (or maybe just to expose this writer’s
inadequacies) every time they played a gig a flyer would seem to fall into my
hand, or an email into my inbox, a couple of days after the event.  But
here they are finally, in the flesh, before me, actually promoting a new album,
which has a release date and everything (‘The Heartlight Set’ is due for release
in June, along with a full UK tour). And they are as real as it seemed they wouldn’t
be. Though not too much, they still retain an aura of raised untouchability. And
they are as perfect as everyone has said they would be. Perfect skin, perfect
bone structure, perfect melodies – analogue and digital – and perfect ambience.
Beautifully unpretentious alt-country with kinks in its shell, floating in zero-gravity,
rebounding off the modern age’s technological comforts, delivered by 2 people
so genuinely beautiful (adorable real-life couple Tabitha and Vinny) they should
be fronting a GAP campaign and owning the fashion mags’ covers, eclipsing The
Kills with one smoldering glance. Basically a PR wet-dream. So why then doth they
languish in cult obscurity?
That could come as a blessing for the time
being though. It does still feel like you could pick them up and put them in your
pocket – and that they might just let you. They banter with us, the audience,
like we have history, Vinny insisting the jet-lag is sending him through a personal
crisis and begging for noisy support from the room, Tabitha telling him to “shut
up” with a giggle and a smile that could melt a hundred thousand million hearts.
Seriously, there can’t be many in here tonight that don’t just want to marry her
right away, even if that meant letting him sleep on the couch because you have
too much damn respect for the man. In the live setting everything’s all
just as effortless and serene as you want it to be, the way Tabitha and Vinny’s
low, melodious and, together, unusual intonations graze into one another, the
way Vinny’s natural, deft touch on the guitar never leads the way, rather nudges
from behind or from the left hand side, the way Tabitha massages her keys making
the songs dissolve, merge and entwine. There are some songs from ‘American Whip’
(‘Valley Stream’, ‘Drugs’, ‘Dosed & Became Invisible’, the utterly wonderful ‘Christmas
Song’) and a host of new ones that perhaps favour more traditional garage and
country stylings with melodies still intact (Tabitha evoking equal aspects of
Loretta Lynn and Sarah Cracknell), and they all sparkle with warmth. It’s between
Rilo Kiley and Air, y’know somewhere really comfortable, and you have to wonder
how far perfection really is off this place. Relevant sites:
http://www.joyzipper.tv
James Berry for Crud Magazine 2004©
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| 04/05 British Sea Power - Live - Scala, London
04/05 Eels - Live - Royal Festival Hall, London
04/05 Doves, Elbow, Longview - Carling 24 , Manchester
04/05 Joy Zipper, ICA London
04/05 The National - 100 Club, London
04/05 Redjetson / Liberez / Twentysixfeet - Marquee, London
04/05 The Warlocks - Bethnal Green Working Men's Club
12/04 Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - ULU, London
12/04 Elbow - Live -Brixton Academy, London
12/04 Franz Ferdinand - Live - Alexandra Palace, London
12/04 Morning Runner - Kings College London
12/04 Carling Weekend Reading Festival 2005
12/04 Sigur Rós - Brixton Academy, London
12/04 Crud Top 20 Albums 2005 |  |
January 2001
July - August 2001
September - October 2001
November - December 2001
January - March 2002
April - July 2002
August - December 2002
January - March 2003
May - August 2003
November 2003
January - March 2004
April - September 2004
October - December 2004
January - March 2005
April - December 2005
January - August 2006
September - December 2006
January - September 2007
October - December 2007
January - May 2008
| | |
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