It's been an undeveloped relationship with Bailterspace for me over the years, mostly me ignoring them and their music, not for any particular reason apart from never actually getting round to exploring it, but mostly because they are NOT The Gordons. Bailterpapce(although not originally), consists of the three original members of Christchurch's legendary post punk, pre grunge alt band The Gordons. The Gordons are unquestionably my all time favourite New Zealand band and even better is that they hailed from my hometown of Christchurch. Their first Album is just the greatesr NZ record ever and although many fans don't rate their second record as much, I love it almost as much and both were big records in my youth. So after they split and went on to form Bailterspace, my attitude was they'll be anywhere as good as The Gordons, and in my opinion they are not.
Recently though I have bought both of Bailterspaces recent albums and did also score some of their early CD's and discovered that they had indeed produced some NZ classics I was familiar with.
Hearing that the original three Gordons were doing a rare tour as Bailterspace(they have never played under The Gordons Moniker since the mid 80's), I thought I had better go.
It was an added bonus that the support act was Wax Chattels, a band from Wellington that I had recently become familiar with after procuring their excellent self titled debut album a couple of months back.
The place was pretty near full, I even had to que a bit to get in, which was a first at Blue Smoke. I was admiring the massive PA speaker stacks and the monster Marshall amps on the stage before Wax Chattels started their set. I had been warned that Bailterspace play it loud and they certainly had the rig to do so. I was prepared with those little foam ear plugs and got them in pretty quick when Wax Chattels started to play. I though, although very loud, the rig sounded bloody good, one of the best I have heard in a while and I find it frustrating that I had to use the ear plugs as they do muffle the sound somewhat while protecting our hearing, I did pull them out a bit just to hear better and Wax Chattels did sound bloody good. They played pretty much the stuff off their new album and I recognized some songs but the record is still new to me so not all was familiar or perhaps just sounded different live. They put on a great show and really threw themselves into their music, the drummer played especially wildly. This three piece consists of bass. drums and electronics and sometimes remind me of their fellow Wellingtonians, All Seeing Hand. A great and pretty wild set from this excellent alternative band.
I was a long wait between sets but Bailterspace finally made it onto the stage. Loud! Yes it was fucking loud.. Even with such a good rig, they feel they have to crank the thing into overload, the bass was so loud that the place fairly shook and you could certainly feel it through the body, I think they just pushed it too far and with it distorting and vibrating the speakers and almost drowning out the guitar. Bailterspace are considered a noise rock band but on record it is easier to hear the subtleties inside the dirge they produce but live it all ends up being just a wall of noise. Alister Parkers singing sounds a lot different live also, a lot more snotty sounding. The drummer varied very little the beats he played, each song having a relentless but not flashy beat that rarely varied and just motored along, quite a contrast to the wild drumming of Wax Chattels. Highlight of the set was the playing of The Gordons Machine song and at least one or two of the classic songs I kinda knew from their rather large back catalog. I did have to remove my ear plugs for the Gordons song and also loosened them later to try and get a better appreciation of the noised they were making on the stage but I am now paying for it 24 hours later even from the short unprotected exposure I did have. I did enjoy moments of their set but it did get a little monotonous in the end and when the band finally finished, I did not stick around for the encore, especially as it was a weeknight and I still had the usual hours drive home.
Recently though I have bought both of Bailterspaces recent albums and did also score some of their early CD's and discovered that they had indeed produced some NZ classics I was familiar with.
Hearing that the original three Gordons were doing a rare tour as Bailterspace(they have never played under The Gordons Moniker since the mid 80's), I thought I had better go.
It was an added bonus that the support act was Wax Chattels, a band from Wellington that I had recently become familiar with after procuring their excellent self titled debut album a couple of months back.
The place was pretty near full, I even had to que a bit to get in, which was a first at Blue Smoke. I was admiring the massive PA speaker stacks and the monster Marshall amps on the stage before Wax Chattels started their set. I had been warned that Bailterspace play it loud and they certainly had the rig to do so. I was prepared with those little foam ear plugs and got them in pretty quick when Wax Chattels started to play. I though, although very loud, the rig sounded bloody good, one of the best I have heard in a while and I find it frustrating that I had to use the ear plugs as they do muffle the sound somewhat while protecting our hearing, I did pull them out a bit just to hear better and Wax Chattels did sound bloody good. They played pretty much the stuff off their new album and I recognized some songs but the record is still new to me so not all was familiar or perhaps just sounded different live. They put on a great show and really threw themselves into their music, the drummer played especially wildly. This three piece consists of bass. drums and electronics and sometimes remind me of their fellow Wellingtonians, All Seeing Hand. A great and pretty wild set from this excellent alternative band.
I was a long wait between sets but Bailterspace finally made it onto the stage. Loud! Yes it was fucking loud.. Even with such a good rig, they feel they have to crank the thing into overload, the bass was so loud that the place fairly shook and you could certainly feel it through the body, I think they just pushed it too far and with it distorting and vibrating the speakers and almost drowning out the guitar. Bailterspace are considered a noise rock band but on record it is easier to hear the subtleties inside the dirge they produce but live it all ends up being just a wall of noise. Alister Parkers singing sounds a lot different live also, a lot more snotty sounding. The drummer varied very little the beats he played, each song having a relentless but not flashy beat that rarely varied and just motored along, quite a contrast to the wild drumming of Wax Chattels. Highlight of the set was the playing of The Gordons Machine song and at least one or two of the classic songs I kinda knew from their rather large back catalog. I did have to remove my ear plugs for the Gordons song and also loosened them later to try and get a better appreciation of the noised they were making on the stage but I am now paying for it 24 hours later even from the short unprotected exposure I did have. I did enjoy moments of their set but it did get a little monotonous in the end and when the band finally finished, I did not stick around for the encore, especially as it was a weeknight and I still had the usual hours drive home.
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