Live Review
Bear Hands @ Dirty Boots – Bloomsbury Bowling Lanes, London
Dirty Boots is fast becoming London’s most interesting new band club night. Having already hosted the buzz of the Golden Silvers, White Denim and Cage the Elephant early on, tonight they played host to New York’s latest hot tip Bear Hands in support to Northen Ireland’s In Case Of Fire. In the strangest and coolest venue it was only Bear Hands – on their first UK tour – who lived up to the hype machine.
As bowling balls crashed down pins Bear Hands must have felt nicely at home in this American themed joint. With a suddenly packed floor they crashed in to life, and despite missing their regular guitarist instantly showed their class. Actually it’s the switch between beautiful quivering and dirty rock guitar lines, which makes this band. long with the inventiveness of the music and chant along vocals from band leader Dylan Rau take this in to Volcano! and even Weezer territory. The main issue with Bear Hands is the vest-wearing bassist who steels attention and detracts from his bouncing lines by standing upfront and singing along to each song, without a microphone. Don’t ever give him one. ‘Vietnam’ and ‘Long Lean Queen’ are real indie-dancefloor fillers and the latter is the lead single from their debut EP ‘Golden’, which is full of their expansive indie. There are just so many bands right now, but Bear Hands definately have the talent and the tunes to stand apart.
The same can’t be said of In Case Of Fire. Having seen Bear Hands tear it up the crowd drifted away leaving a scattering to be brought back to reality. Their humourless brand of prog-rock verges closer to metal and offers nothing new or anything I want to hear again. At least one band provided more entertainment than the bowling lanes. Dirty Boots got there first again and Bear Hands can be added to their list of great new things.