After a vintage rock-and-roll performance from Stagger Lee (who have a great bendy gyrating guitarist, and possibly one of the best singers in Dublin hollering their deep earthy hooks) on came the act of the night – Fight Like Apes.
Sounding a little like the musical Annie, with lyrics rewritten by The Mighty Boosh, and then mixed randomly with Kraftwerk’s rough demos, Fight Like Apes blow the roof off the Village this evening. Frontwoman MayKay begins the set with an impressive architectural beehive protruding from her skull, which goes through several distinctive stages as she gyrates, leaps into the audience and hollers – she simultaneously calls to mind Pattie from Absolutely Fabulous, Robert Smith, Siouxsie Sioux and Cousin It. Unlike the beehive, the music stays elevated for the whole set. Dirty distorted synths, samples from B-movies, shouty backing vocals and a rock-band rhythm section pelt seven kinds of shite out of the audience, while songs like ‘Jake Summers’ and ‘Lend Me Your Face’ already sound like classics. They even debut some new songs, one of which has a great refrain of “you’re fired.”
It’s all so great, in fact, that afterwards the Von Bondies sound like the generic blues-rock jam band that they try and pretend they’re not. Still lead by Jason Stollsteimer, but with a line-up that’s been perpetually changing (yet which somehow always seems the same), the Von Bondies play like a band who've been touring for too long. The best bits are when the girls (guitarist Alicia Gbur and bass player Leann Banks) sing along with the refrains because that lightens up the rock sludge and occasionally makes them seem like a bluesy Human League. ‘C’mon C’mon’ is a highlight (obviously, or otherwise it wouldn’t be so beloved of advertisers) and the duet Stollsteimer does with Donna from Stagger Lee is pretty cool. But it has to be said, the Von Bondies were put in the shadows by their support bands.