Wednesday 16th April 2008 @ Louisiana, Bristol
Playing Alongside: The Sugars, The Jinx

The Bare Threads are a bluesy pop band with strong, silky female vocals, reminiscent of The Long Blondes (if they have to be compared). The assortment of jazzy drums, bopping bass and a mix of smooth-cutting guitar chords means everything fits together into a well worked, coherent band, with well written songs. However, it is the lack of variation between the songs styles which is something of a let down. The lack of change in pace and the seemingly fear of the musicians to exploring their instruments’ potential means that The Bare Threads plateau. The only variance in sound came from a “song finished two days ago”, which comes in the form of a fuzz-pedaled filled chorus. It leaves to interpret this band as one which functions as a well rehearsed unit, comfortable with good playing poppy-blues but suffer from the pitfalls of the genre where their gig becomes stagnated as they get further into their set.

The Jinx avoid the issue with garage blues, suffered by the like of The Sonics of repetition of song styles and structures. They avoid this through the set up of two guitars and a drum (sometimes one guitar is substituted for a harmonica) - the bass is not missed - and secondly they keep the songs interesting by changing their tempo, having changes in styles from garage, to a garage-rockabilly hybrid. They play with a lot of charisma and energetically throw themselves into their set which pays off for as entertaining watch. They end with a medley, giving a nod to influences (Beatles’ Money, and Sonic, How Love Will Travel). This is a band who enjoy some of the credit for Bristol’s creative and varied local scene and their music should be heard by all that have an opportunity to see it.

The Sugars, the headliner for the Louisiana’s bluesy-hillybilly band night are a energetic, three piece that do that old trick of blending male-female vocals to powerful, poppy effect. The male slurs and wails through the songs, which do justice to his impressive teddy-boy quiff, while the female is smooth and echoey. The drums are well developed and aren’t limited by repetitive styles and helps keeps the band interesting to what is a difficult genre to keep interesting (I can’t stress that enough!). Songs like the emotional tinged to You Better Go Now which they end with, together with the fast paced, but cute-ish Monsters mean that this a band who are dynamic and entertaining.

www.myspace.com/barethreadsband

Pete Winnicki