Page 22 - RYAN'S GIG GUIDE JANUARY 2015

RGG January 2015 - p.22
It’s not every day that you get to see the
frontman of a rock band make a heartfelt
dedication to his wife and throw out cheese jokes
at the audience with gay abandon all in one set
but that’s exactly what I got when I caught the
Auctioneers live last month
The band themselves are a pretty straightforward
rock group from Glasgow so that intro has made
them sound a little bit more off the wall than they
actually are but who said rock and slightly random
light comedy couldn’t mix?
I think the sum total of my knowledge of the band
prior to this rather rainy night north of the boarder
was the single You Got It Bad which I
reviewed a few months previously so I walked into
Ivory Blacks not really knowing what to
expect Thankfully after such a long trip what I
found was a band right at the top of their game
I always like bands to really come out of the blocks
firing and that’s exactly what Auctioneers did with
their opening gambit Feel It Thin
Lizzy esque dulling guitars punctuated what was
a really strong start both musically and tempo
wise No sign of nerves or anything like that the
band just hit the ground running at tremendous
speed It was at the conclusion of another all
action effort Breathe where the first of the cheese
jokes made an appearance and you could tell that
everyone was in a good mood because it actually
went down very well
Following tune Your Misery was characterised by
some great guitar work from guitarist Greg
Leighton as frontman Kev Murray continued to
dominate the stage and hold the audience’s
attention with his all action style The only
blemish was that this time his attempt at cheese
based comedy didn’t go down quite as well I men
tioned in my introduction that there was
dedication thrown into the set and that
dedication came in the form of a rendition of
American Girl As with any dedication it was a tad
self indulgent but I’m willing to let it go as I’m not
totally heartless (Contrary to popular belief) For
those of you wondering the back story was that
Murray had been married to his American wife for
years on st November… See what he did there?
I mentioned earlier that I had previously reviewed
You Git It Bad when it came out and it sounded as
good live as I had hoped The intro riff still
carried the same impact the vocal was absolutely
spot on and the guitar solo delivered on every
level As the opening strains of ballad Grace drifted
around the room the smoke machine lifted its head
and smoke slowly drifted across the stage It was
all very atmospheric in that ’s disco kind of
way it was slightly bizarre but added to what was
quiet a poignant moment in the set
The penultimate track of the set Hello My Old
Friend presented me with a gig going first
Mid way through the song the whole band froze
and frontman Murray chatted to the audience and
when I say the band froze I really mean
exactly that for this minute or so interlude no
one moved an inch or strummed a note of any
kind As I say it was something that I had never
seen before and I thought it was a great little
touch it just gave the band something extra to
help them stand out
For the grand finale Something You Want Murray
ditched his guitar and for a few moments while on
his knees shared vocal duties with bassist Suv
These guys left absolutely everything on the stage
and had put on a great show for those in
attendance and as a paying customer you really
can’t ask for anything more than that
AUCTIONEERS