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- Date Released: May 17, 2005
- Genre: Alternative/Punk
- Label: pinkflag / state51
Wire sparking as brightly as ever
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We Say...
Wire have never been big on recapitulating their past, and in this 2004 performance from their Send tour, they spend their entire main set playing material from that album and the Read & Burn EPs that preceded it. Judging from this recording, totally ignoring the past is a tack more long-running bands should take on stage: Wire are audibly thrilled to be playing songs that mean something to them in the moment, and they thrash and buck like kids a third their age.
Without the serrated digital edge of their studio recordings, these songs become as massive as heavy metal but as austere as modern art. The slow-burning "99.9" becomes an ideal opener, a bubbling electronic presence that erupts into volcanic punk rock, and from there on out it's a consistent, monomaniacal assault on the new material. (Graham Lewis, once the leather-jacketed romantic of the band, has bulked up his bass tone and his voice into twin bludgeons.)
Finally, for their encore, they reach back for four tracks from 1977's Pink Flag album — the oblique but furious take on punk rock that provided the DNA for the rest of their career. They've actually gotten faster and more powerful with time — "Surgeon's Girl," in particular, zooms by so quickly it could decapitate an unwary listener — and the closing "Pink Flag" has become a full-on jet engine, now reduced from the rococo excess of its original two-chord incarnation to a single relentless chord that blasts away for nine minutes. -
They Say...
In the Shakespeare tragedy referenced by the Scottish Play DVD's title, Macbeth compares life to the work of a performer who "struts and frets his hour upon the stage," ultimately amounting to "sound and fury, signifying nothing." Wire's April 2004 performance at Glasgow's Tramway Theatre might not grapple with metaphysical issues, but there's much strutting and fretting and plenty of sound and fury. When the band resumed live activity in 2000, it did so with surprisingly assaultive gusto. Tom Gidley's concert film captures that aspect of latter-day Wire: four angry not-so-young men in heavy metal dancefloor mode, charging through a set of largely recent material with an intensity and urgency rivaling their sound circa Pink Flag. After the barrage of tracks like "Comet" and "Spent," the chugging "I Don't Understand" offers a momentary respite, then the band proceeds to torch some of its oldest numbers, eventually signing off with a rough-edged makeover of "Pink Flag." Rather than offer a flat, one-dimensional concert film, Gidley's cameras focus in on the bandmembers' individual labors. A sweaty Graham Lewis throttles his bass while Colin Newman dances around like someone at the office Christmas party after a few too many drinks. By contrast, drummer Robert Grey is a picture of focus. The odd man out is Bruce Gilbert, standing almost in the wings; although he gives the impression of never having seen a guitar before, he adds a crucial layer of noise, often without seeming to move his hands. The DVD also contains footage from a 2003 event at London's Barbican: four songs from the Read & Burn EPs showcase Es Devlin's Samuel Beckett-meets-Spinal Tap set design, which places the bandmembers in separate boxes lined across the stage. The Scottish Play is an excellent document of a band refusing to age gracefully. [Also included is a CD of the Tramway gig.]
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| 01. |  |
99.9 ((live 2005)) |
7:44 |
|
| 02. | |
Germ Ship ((live 2005)) |
1:39 |
|
| 03. | |
Mr. Marx's Table ((live 2005)) |
4:29 |
|
| 04. | |
1st Fast ((live 2005)) |
1:33 |
|
| 05. | |
Read & Burn ((live 2005)) |
2:50 |
|
| 06. | |
The Agfers of Kodack ((live 2005)) |
4:04 |
|
| 07. | |
Comet ((live 2005)) |
2:43 |
|
| 08. | |
In the Art of Stopping ((live 2005)) |
3:44 |
|
| 09. | |
Spent ((live 2005)) |
4:20 |
|
| 10. | |
I Don't Understand ((live 2005)) |
4:23 |
|
| 11. | |
Strange ((live 2005)) |
3:09 |
|
| 12. | |
106 Beats That ((live 2005)) |
1:27 |
|
| 13. | |
Surgeon's Girl ((live 2005)) |
1:20 |
|
| 14. | |
Pink Flag ((live 2005)) |
9:42 |
|
14 Total Tracks, 53:07 Total Length
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Credits
- Colin Newman - Mixing // Denis Blackham - Mastering // Dave Coppenhall - Design // Tom Gidley - Editing // Tom Gidley - Direction // Tim Anderson - Stage Lighting
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