Supersonic festival review

Jul 29 2009 By Peter Guy

But it's not all sonic carnage and wierdisms. Saturday's timetable is peppered with a wealth of musical magic. Marnie Stern bring sex, riffs and a playful abandon in a set which has the masses smiling and wiggling their arses from start to finish. Kim Hiorthøy lends Supersonic a slice of The Haçienda to the Custard Factory utilising devastating beats, ecstatic rhythms and old school visuals turning the boxlike Factory Club performance space into a mini superclub. The Growing provide a yin to Hiorthøy's yang melding abrasive guitars with languid textures and terrifying atmospherics which recall the likes of F*ck Buttons and Black Dice.

Elsewhere Glasgow's Remember Remember combine the post-rock cinematics you'd associate with their Rock Action label mates Mogwai but infuse loops with handclaps, glistening xylophones, dancing violin and a multitude of extras provided by mainman Graeme Ronald and his seven-strong support team. It's hugely moving, but wouldn't seem out of place down the indie disco.

There are of course blips. Rose Kemp is simply laughable adopting the rarely-seen zombie with PMT routine screaming uncontrollably while bashing her guitar indiscriminately, Flower/Corsano Duo are largely forgettable andLight Trap are plain dull. But these moments are fleeting and such is the ease to alternate round the venues you've never reason to feel downbeat.

Away from dancefloor, there's much to explore in this alt-muso's paradise. A photographic studio depicting music's most colourful characters, an assortment of collage, textiles and art projects are exhibited around the various locations, a small but delightful array of foodstalls (the Thai green curry goes down a treat while the Italian meatballs smell utterly divine) circle the market while upstairs in the tearoom a whole hall is dedicated to merchandise as bands and fans lap up in one big communal mutual appreciation society.

I pluck Fan - the 2009 35-minute one-track release by Japanese mathrock terrorists Nisennenmondai who earlier in the afternoon blow all senses with a 40 minute set of exhilarating power and technical precision. Combining the psyche swirl of The Boredoms and the beat-centric essence of Battles - drummer Sayaka Himeno carries one track with ridiculous rolls for almost the 20 minute mark before bouncing out of her seat sending her sticks flying and the dancing crowd into raptures. It's fair to say they're our top picks in a day littered with special memories.

Also high up were Getintothis favourites Diagonal, who revel in the large Space 2 Stage ramping up the noize, mellotron, guitar histrionics and more importantly the chance to dabble outside their already expansive progressive zone.

Another favourite and former record of the week champions Tartufi closed their maiden UK tour with a stunning display of musicianship as San Francisco duo Lynne Angel and Brian Gorman weaved all manner of loops into a tangled mélange of dense structures. All 13-minutes of Engineering sounds, impossibly, even more spectacular live than it does on wax.

Similarly, Italian's Zu take the frenetic aggression of recent longplayer Carboniferous and inject a slicing, almost techno approach and as the midnight hour the Outside Stage turns into a frenzy of curdled figurines.

But little could match the mess and sheer chaotic carnivalesque splendour of Monotonix's Saturday night closing set. Their infamy is the stuff of legend but nothing could prepare for what unfolded.

Setting up in the crowd is nothing new - what is is having the crowd lift you high above their heads while balancing on a drumkit with a three-foot bin over your head while very, very drunk crowd surfers bodyslam into you as you attempt a drum roll.

It sounds exactly like it was: ridiculous, hilarious, exhilarating and highly dangerous.

And that was just the beginning as these three wiry, yet athletic Israelis brought crew, various artists, police and entire Rough Trade merchandise staffers on to the stage as they watched wide-eyed (some behind their hands) at the complete insanity before them.

All the drama is completely dependent on the audience's willingness to get involved - and boy do they as Levi Yomtov instructs them to hoist him up high above as he swims across the bodies before smashing down to the concrete before climbing up various parts of the venue while later engaging in ridiculous scenarios with various members of an increasingly worse for wear crowd.

It'd be a lie to say the buzzsaw garage rock matched the eyefeast on offer, but nobody cared - as even the security whipped out their camera phones to get a shot of probably the wildest gig Birmingham's ever seen.

And in the heartland of heavy metal you can't argue with that.