The first of two gigs tonight was this absolute cracker in Frankie & The Heartstrings record shop in Fawcett Street, Sunderland. Not a massive turnout in the shop when the band took to the stage at about 8pm after the set by support “Simpsons Abattoir band” fronted by Frog from the now defunct Kubichek; but the people that were there got a real visual and audio treat from a band that deserve to be much much bigger in their native north east.
They took to the stage and David introduced the band with “Hello we’re Goy Boy McIlroy, in a small intimate setting you might think the pressure is on us to perform well but the pressure is really on you to enjoy yourselves, so just relax, we’ll take all the pressure off, We’ll play the music and you can just enjoy it. That’s it simple relationship and they immediately kicked off their set with the killer ‘Social Mobility Blues’ an excellent track they’ve only started playing recently. David was behaving himself until they started ‘Agoraphobia’ then he was off on one of his many wanders through the audience, climbing up on the sofas, wrapping himself up in a blanket then wandering back to the stage where he curled up into a ball under the blanket as the song played out. Another old one in the form of Psychological Plaything was followed by a new slower track that I don’t know the name of but which sounded really good. The upcoming new single ‘Redemption Caramel’ came next followed by ‘another new one ‘Midnight Crisis’ which saw David dash off towards the back of the shop with the mic in hand. Frankie was behind the crowd pulling slack in the lead but the junction box the lead was plugged into went flying across the floor and straight into someone’s foot and the mic lead went flying with the vocals coming to a dead stop. Frankie was straight on the case though tracing the lead back and putting it back in place. David meanwhile was in the road outside the shop chasing three passers by.
By the end of the track David was back at the stage, seriously out of breath but after a bit of banter to help him recover it was straight into a string of old tracks starting with ‘Ro-Langs’, ‘The Pilgrim’ and ‘Black Glove’ with David here there and everywhere, even hiding away in the bands back stage chill out room for a while during one of the songs. They had planned to do God’s Calling but in the end it was dropped from the set and they finished off the gig with ‘Writhing’ their previous single. David was at it again, rearranging the sofas behind the crowd then grabbing half a dozen people and pulling them one by one into the space between them. I was number 6 and he got his bottle of water and poured it into my mouth then did the same to the others, as the song picked up the pace he grabbed a few of the six and they all collapsed into a heap onto the sofa on the right hand side while singing the lyric “you’re going down” then he grabbed onto me and he pulled me over onto the other sofa while hanging onto my lower legs. The song faded out, everyone got back up and David thanked everyone for coming out and plugged their appearance at Stockton Calling on 19 April.
Are we officially friends David asked Dave Harper as he was sorting the leads out at the end of the gig. Dave shook his head but that didn’t put David off, we’ll just give it a couple of weeks then, and that was it. The end of an absolutely brilliant gig that really was the dogs bollocks. Best I’ve seen at pop Recs Ltd by a long way and if you don’t want to get caught up in David’s antics then don’t stand at the front in the middle of the stage. Me, I never learn I’ll be at the front next chance I get.
https://www.facebook.com/goyboymcilroy
http://www.poprecsltd.com/
nxb003 