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Mohair @ the Soundhaus, Northampton, October 21, 2003

MOHAIR

What's in a name? Nothing apparently. Natasha House prises blood from the proverbial stone with press darlings, Mohair.

03/11/2003

MOHAIR have had a heavy afternoon. They are quite possibly suffering from a collective marker pen fume-induced headache after plodding their way through 500 leaflets mistakenly printed with the offer of a free t-shirt for anyone who signs up to the Mohair mailing list. Apparently, the t-shirts never materialised, but the leaflets did. So Berol pens in hand, Pete Baker (drums and vocals), Alex Richards (piano, organ and vocals), Tim Slade (bass and vocals) and Tom Billington (guitar and vocals) have spent the five or so hours pre-gig at Northampton’s Soundhaus ‘amending’ the flyers and sampling the local cuisine – Safeway’s spring rolls. Remarkably chipper for a man who’s still recovering from the fallout of said bureaucratic cock-up, Tom reassures me my hair has potential, as I am downcast it’s not the biggest barnet in the room.

MOHAIRSpeaking of hair, Mohair, he says, is more to do with the mohair-bikini-clad woman on mohairfashion.com that any cheeky hip-hop lingo play on words. “It’s just a name,” he proffers, in explanation to my astonishingly reporter-like inquiries.

“An umbrella?” I suggest, randomly.

“Yeah, an umbrella. I’ll have to remember that” comes the polite reply.

Mohair bikinis reluctantly aside, this was a gig which exceeded my, to be fair quite moderate, expectations.

Northampton band Led By Lies opened with a clutch of angular-punk-metal-shaped rock songs akin to LostProphets or Hell Is For Heroes.

Having clearly realised the secret to a good shouty shouty band is to have someone who can actually sing doing the shouting, LBL need only time to build up their incisive melodies and work on the message (“I’m going to take you back top mine/Show you a good time” – hardly the mettle to withstand competition from painfully relevant politicised punk bands like Kinesis, Funeral For A Friend or the Mars Volta) before they can offer themselves as a fitting piece of the ever-changing puzzle that is the British rock scene.

Mohair began sounding so Britpop in places I almost heard shades of Kula Shaker, but I quickly abandoned that image and gave in to the Hammond organ madness, raucous guitar riffs and funky bass heavy interludes that border on excessive, tempered with brilliant vocal harmonies like those over-hyped but pleasant-sounding US West Coast pretenders, The Thrills.

Then in self-conscious homage to the Darkness (“Who in one short year got the whole of macho Britain singing like girls” Tom stated admiringly) Tom raises his flying-V guitar aloft and gives it his Justin-peaked screeching all, before racing, nay, skipping through the audience. Judging by this triumphant guitar-pop laden performance there’s no need for merch gimmicks to induce a dedicated following.

Mohair are well on their way to donning the impeccably knit cardigan of success, and if I’m wrong, at least they know how to get a cheap high on marker pens.

Tour dates...

November
03/11/2003: Dr. Drakes, Aberdeen
04/11/2003: Bar Boosa Paisley
06/11/2003: King Tuts, Glasgow
07/11/2003: Kaz Bar, Scarborough
08/11/2003: Crypt, Hastings
10/11/2003: Liverpool University, Liverpool
12/11/2003: Freebutt, Brighton
13/11/2003: University - Dylans Bar, Bournemouth
14/11/2003: White Horse, High Wycombe
15/11/2003: Railway Inn, Winchester
17/11/2003: Fibbers, York
18/11/2003: Soundhouse, Colchester
19/11/2003: Bullingdon Arms, Oxford
20/11/2003: Priors Inn, Bury St Edmunds
21/11/2003: Forum, Tunbridge Wells
22/11/2003: Cavern, Exeter
26/11/2003: Water Rats, London
27/11/2003: Boat Race, Cambridge
28/11/2003: Met Lounge, Peterborough
29/11/2003: Moles, Bath

Relevant Sites:
www.mohairmusic.com
www.soundhaus.com


Natasha House for Crud Magazine 2003©


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