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To Hell review
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To Number One Son review

"D-Day", Wednesday 09/05/01, Concourse, SUSU

The TV cameras were out in force today to record one of the highlights of the cheese calendar, where Sheffield's finest get to parade their talents outside in the glorious summer sunshine. D- Day provides a lunchtime fix for the hardcore cheese kids who can't wait till the Big One to get their post-Jigsaw thrills. The DJs choose to hit us immediately with hardcore commercial dance for the first hour, reminiscent of the early stages of Loveshack or the Big One, thus making the early arrivals feel right at home. The usual favourites, Darude, Modjo, ATB etc are all in there, leading up nicely to the next hour which moves into poppier territory with the likes of Shaggy, Kylie and Robbie.

But it's not just the music that makes this event special but all the added extras, like the giant pink elephant prominent on the Concourse. The stalls and bright yellow banners courtesy of the 'Save our Halls' campaign effectively complement the distinctive use of natural lighting in the venue. Best of all are the live acts on stage, with the MCing of local Socialist Alliance parliamentary candidates and NUS representatives sending the assembled masses into a euphoric frenzy. Overall a highly worthwhile event; it's worth setting the video to record the highlights when they're shown, possibly on the BBC's 'Look North' or other such regional news magazine.

Daryl Gowlett
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Disco 2001, every Thursday, The Republic

Last Thursday I had the good fortune to experience the Disco 2001 phenomenon which is held in that Camelot of dance and cheese: The Republic. Packed to the rafters with jack-the-lads and loose women, this was always going to be a major hit on the cheese circuit. It didn't disappoint either, with two rooms of banging beats and cheese anthems. The place was absolutely packed aswell, completely filling the grandiose surroundings, and forming a scrum at the bar. This however did not hinder carnage too much, what I was expecting, though the bouncers decided that I blatantly look about 15, and ID'd me. On production of my proof of age card, they also wittily remarked how I still had 'the same daft haircut'. If only Fuzzclub could hire such comic geniuses.

Norwegian Tom
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Hell @ the Leadmill, Tuesday 29/05/01

'Cause the devil has all the best tunes'

The flyer promises a night of commercial dance anthems from DJ Ashley James at the Leadmill's Tuesday night house/trance-fest, but tonight's eclectic DJ set throws up more than a few surprises. Due to student exams, there's quite a sparse crowd at the Leadmill tonight, perhaps only 150 or so hardcore clubbers, spread out over both rooms (the second room containing a somewhat unimaginative 70s-style disco). Although this does dampen the atmosphere slightly, the music soon makes up for the lack of numbers. Commercial dance is what the crowd wants, and commercial dance is what the crowd gets, but only after an hour of the DJ teasing them with an assortment of cheese, indie, and, just to rub it in, commercial dance/cheese crossover tracks by the likes of Modjo and Kylie. Various indie/metal/alternative classics by bands such as Aerosmith, Reef, Toploader, 5ive and the Happy Mondays provide the low-building introduction to a whirlwind commercial dance set.

And what a set it is. Deft mixing and a skilful crossover of house and trance beats create an impressive momentum, dancefloor anthems by Darude, Fragma and Sonique (whose 'Feels so good' is impressively tranced up tonight) effectively worked together to create a truly uplifting half-hour set. To keep up this sort of pace would probably result in a euphoric overload, and the DJ wisely decides to calm the crowd down, promising "a bit more cheese and a bit more indie", immediately launching into the ultimate cheese/dance/indie crossover, the Bloodhound Gang's 'Bad Touch'. The crowd appreciates this highly impressive set, particularly enjoyed by Sheffield's finest rock/metal DJ, Rude Dog, seen enthusiastically dancing to the commercial dance anthems. The night's only real disappointment comes from the podium dancers, who finish over an hour before the end, typical of a half-hearted performance which sees one of the dancers drinking water and adjusting her shoes instead of dancing. However, this shouldn't detract from a truly great performance by DJ Ashley James; expect him to be headlining the Gatecrasher Sound System next summer.

Daryl Gowlett
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Ozzfest

Getting there was not a difficult task, the train took around 1.5 hours, and as 99% of the people on it were going to Ozzfest everyone was quite friendly, we were soon smoking weed with some new acqaintances and talking about the forthcoming bands. There was a rapid bus service straight to the site, packed but fast. Upon arrival the first thing I noticed was the shape of the venue itself, looking much like a large version of a Greek Theater - a semi circular hillside of grass, with a flat area which contained shops, open grass and the two stages. Behind this was a pathway with shops toilets etc, and the entrances. Two important things to note was how full it was, finding an area to sit was easy enough, but some areas were quite packed, and moving around quickly was not easy. The heat was notable and extreme, many people were sunbathing on the hillside area, which was perfect for watching bands you were interested in but not prepared to mosh for… even factor 35 suntan lotion failed to fully protect me. In the moshes it was hard to stop yourself removing items of clothing, and many were topless (sadly not the women - of which there were many). Although arriving too late for the very early bands, the most prominent of these were hed(pe). Having spoken to various people who did see it I am assured the performance was equally powerful as the occasion on which I did see them, in many ways better live, although ozzfests limited time allowance for each band meant they did not play all their best songs. Soulfly were probably the best of all the bands there. Opening with the first track of the recent album Primitive (album and song name) they then played Roots - originally a Sepultura song, the crowd went pretty wild to this. Bleed was one of the highlight, Calvera being his usual energetic self, Tom Araya of Slayer fame was bought on stage to perform Terrorist - another track from the new album. The mosh was extreme at points, and as the final song came the crowd were already expecting Corey Taylor to perform JumpDaFuckUp, as he came on the noise level was astonishing, and the whole song was quite insane. Although only 6 songs were actually played it felt much more like a full performance, and the crowd was undoubtedly pleased. We (my friend and I) randomly met up with a couple of other people from my school after Soulfly, we saw them a few times again throughout.
Union Underground and Black Label Society were both relatively small acts, neither had a great following, and although they put a lot in the following band was Mudvayne - a hardcore following had turned out. Although not in the mosh area, it was still easy to understand the madness within, Mudvayne were possibly the most extreme band music wise of the festival, and the performance represented this. Lead singer looked much like a scarier member of slipknot, those who have seen the video to 'Dig' would recognize the attire - looking something between a cyborg, deep sea diver, Corey Taylor and a WWI pilot - except much scarier than any. In the 10-20 minute gaps between bands visits to the various shops found at any festival were taken, the beer tent being a favourite. After moshing long periods of lying on grass were undertaken.
Much of the festival turnout was for the highly innovative Tool, the singer (skinhead) looked a little like REM frontman Michael Stipe, but not in dress - he wore only a quite tight pair of black shorts and looked like a science experiment (this may have partly been heat related). As well as playing songs from the first two albums many songs were from the just released album. Only owing the former I was able to identify all of Tool's best classics, 46&2 and Stinkfist had the crowd going, but the start of Sober totally changed the mood and immediately even the areas where before people had been standing and watching in groups were transformed into mosh pits, this was certainly a highlight of the festival. The video in the background was exceptional, for most bands the screen at the back of the stage merely showed the normal close ups of band and pans of crowd and singer - Tool on the other hand had surreal images flickering on loops in time with their songs. It is quite impossible to understand what these were like without either being there or by watching one of Tool's music videos - needless to say I believe the producer was the same as that of the original Alien film. It was in the mosh for Tool when I suspect I lost my railcard and about £10 - this did not help the water situation, luckily I was able to borrow.
It was just after the end of Tool when the extent of litter started to be realised, every festival has its litter problems, and while paper cups were not very obvious, the amount of plastic bottles was astounding - this soon resulted in large scale bottle fights. Near the main inlet to the hillside an area of grass had become quite literally covered with bottles, the ground could not be soon for an area of about 20 metres squared, which amounts to a few thousand bottles. At the bottom people were grabbing them and throwing them as hard as they could at other fighters at the top of the hill, who returned the favour. Most of them were empty so injury was minimised, but even so the pure volume must have ended in some tragedy. I joined in for a very short time.
Slipknot were in some ways slightly disappointing, they played a lot of new material as yet unheard, and the crowd did not seem particularly pleased. The clown's drum kit was on some kind of pneumatic system and would raise up about 3-4 metres regularly, generally with him standing somewhere on it. This made for interesting viewing. The new masks of the crew were not really any improvement on the old, although Joey's mask seemed more extreme nailwise from where I was standing. Purity was one of the best performances they did, and the beginning of Eyeless which normally starts with about 5 seconds of jungle instead started with about 2 minutes of industrial heavy beats, this made their otherwise quite standard act a little more exciting. As standard Corey kept the crowd active, screaming and shouting, and as always telling us we were the 'best fucking crowd' etc. One highlight was when he asked the entire crowd to lie down, this gave rise to much injury and shouting, but a lot of people did not take part. Unsurprisingly the crowd loved it, and went pretty mental, culminating during Wait And Bleed.
Disturbed were pretty standard, instead of the electric chair performance seen at the Astoria the skinhead singer came out of a spiked cage at the start. They played about 8 tracks of their album, much of the crowd had come to see them and the reception was awesome. As the act before Sabbath they had a lot to live up to, and managed very well. At the start of Down With The Sickness there was a call from the lead to create a whirlpool in the crowd. Having been in a few whirlpools before I can say that this organised mosh was by far the most insane, a huge surge of people moshing in a circular motion, running and punching and pushing - something hard to really contemplate without seeing, I will not try to explain quite what it was like. Most of the crowd who had come to see the newer bands now left, and the overall crowd was depleted for Sabbath. Having said this the proportion who sat around and watch was also massively decreased, and the standing/moshing crowd was far larger for Sabbath than any other band. Having not heard much of them I found it hard to judge, but the atmosphere surrounding it was amazing, and merely seeing Ozzy at Ozzfest was an experience in itself.
We left about halfway through to avoid the crowds, and at the train station suddenly realised I was standing next to three friends who I had been at Reading with, this made the train journey home much more interesting, the transport services were surprisingly effective - no one was standing.
Overall, bloody quality. For a once day performance the diversity and general genius of bands was excellent. If the lineup is even half as good next year there is no way I would miss it.

God
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Lostprophets + Skindred + Kilkus @ The Square, Harlow, Essex, Sunday 17/06/01

The prospect of seeing some of the country’s finest nu-metal talent sees various Week of Cheese messageboard regulars descend on the unsuspecting Essex nu-town of Harlow on a pleasant summer evening. The scenery near the venue is uninspiring; a main road, a roundabout and a multi-storey car park. Inside the venue things are also slightly unsettling, the 13s-and-over age policy meaning that some visitors feel somewhat old in a sea of teenage wallet chains and baggy trousers. Perhaps the parents who come to pick up their offspring later in the evening also feel the same way.

First up are local legends Kilkus, members of which live in places such as Walthamstow and Woodford, according to Rik, who is later asked by the Kilkus singer on stage where he comes from. Some parts of their songs sound exactly like KoRn, some exactly like the Deftones, some exactly like System of a Down, and some exactly like SlipKnoT, particularly the vocals at the end of ‘Spit it Out’. Despite this, they’re actually quite good, although their repeated encouragement of moshpit violence will perhaps limit their potential to cross-over into the cheese scene. Skindred are the remains of early-90s legends Dub War, and the singer’s ragga vocal style brings obvious comparisons to Rastafarian hardcore legends Bad Brains. Underneath their music is a combination of funk and heavy metal elements. This means that they sound exactly the same as every other nu-metal band.

Next up are headliners Lostprophets. They come from Wales, and their singer is called Ian Watkins. ‘H’ from teen pop heroes Steps also comes from Wales, and his real name is Ian Watkins (true fact). While their metal choruses work, the quieter verses lack effective melodies, and they’re a lot worse than the last time I saw them, where technical problems provided large amounts of entertaining onstage banter. Still, it’s enjoyable enough mosh music, which keeps the kids happy; unfortunately there’s no encore, with the bassist overheard claiming that they have ‘no more songs’ left to play. A nu-metaller outside is also heard asking if anyone’s seen a ‘large man with a beard’. Overall an enjoyable gig, despite the lack of any truly innovative music, helped by the quality of the venue; perhaps there should be future Week of Cheese outings to the Square, with notable upcoming gigs including Sheffield legends This Girl, and Egyptian black metallers Nile.

Daryl Gowlett
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Day Two of the Urban Games, Clapham Common, London, Saturday 28/07/01

"If I die before I wake, at least in heaven I can watch Lostprophets"

Despite its early finish (9 p.m.) and miniscule number of bands (three on Saturday and Sunday, none on Friday), the Urban games still feels like a proper festival. Dodgy toilets, overpriced fast food, merchandise stalls with an unsurprising amount of expensive skatewear and a more surprising amount of trance, hard house and UK garage compilations; it's basically a miniature version of Reading without the campsite. There's something here for all in the family, with a mother and her eight year old son seen admiring the selection of Limp Bizkit hoodies on display. Also available are red New Era baseball caps, so you too can achieve the Durst look for a mere ?15. The afternoon is taken up by skateboarding and BMX competitions; the tricks are entertaining for a while, despite the frequency with which the skaters fall over, but after a while lazing around on the grass becomes a preferable option.

The skate-related fun and games finish at 6.30, and some of the crowd makes the effort to go and watch the bands. Opening band Vanilla Pod and headliners Snuff are both punk bands, decent but unremarkable, the former better than the latter who really have been around for far too long. Of more interest is the set in between the two by Lostprophets, a band who you get the feeling are developing a cult following judging by the number of their T-shirts in the crowd and the enthusiasm of the (mostly teenage) audience, most of whom seem to know all of the words.

After their disappointing performance in Harlow a few weeks ago, Lostprophets are back on form again this evening. Ian Watkins is a charismatic frontman, whose boy-band style poses and appearance (we see him wandering round the fast-food stalls earlier wearing all-white, thus looking like a member of Westlife) distinguish him from the macho aggression of most sports-metallers. One of the guitarists is also spotted walking around the site, and is mistaken for Wes Borland (Limp Bizkit) by some members of the crowd. The 'prophets play a short but effective set, opening with crowd-pleasers 'Shinobivsdragonninja' and 'Thefakesoundofprogress', and ending with the ever-popular 'Kobrakai'. The band prove adept at avoiding the regular flow of bottles thrown at the stage, and there is no shortage of ten year-old crowd surfers, one of whom is encouraged to mosh on stage by Watkins. The 'prophets impressive performance rounds off an enjoyable day in the sunshine, the day's most apt observation being 'Look - there's a metaller' by an associate of one of the more artistically-minded members of the audience.

Daryl Gowlett
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Number One Son @ Corporation (City Hall Ballroom), Friday 16/11/01

This gig is an enticing prospect; not just a rare visit to everyone's favourite Sheffield rock night, but the chance to see an upcoming nu-metal band who are, according to the publicity posters, "mates of the Lost Prophetz" (sic). First impressions of this first visit to one of Corp's temporary venues are rather bemused - the dingy rock night is in a very large and very smart ballroom with white walls, white pillars round the sides and varnished wooden panelling. This is metal in a museum, albeit one with a vibrating dancefloor when enough people are moshing.

Somewhat delayed, the band take to the stage, and their appearance is that of the stereotypical nu-metal band - all black attire, shaved heads apart from one guy with long hair. Even better, their music is completely generic nu-metal as well, sounding like bands such as TapRoot, Disturbed and Faith No More, although this is perhaps more progressive than sounding exactly the same as KoRn and Bizkit. The only thing missing is the lack of the DJ, although it's quite possible that there was one on the part of the stage that I couldn't see, given that DJs in most nu-metal bands tend to be quite superfluous anyway.

The final piece of the jigsaw - the band appear to be quite corporate too, informing us that they're about to be plugged on MTV (2?). In the subsequent rock night, the DJ treats us to more nu-metal, the usual Lostprophets, Incubus, KoRn etc but also the delights of obscure TapRoot. So then, whilst this gig certainly wasn't good, it was certainly comic, and because of its generic nature, so 2001 that it hurts.

Daryl Gowlett
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