Photos: Remy Connolly
(on desktop / laptop click on first photo above to start slideshow)
Last Saturday night Dundalk experimental noise-rock quintet Just Mustard played a sold out headline show in The Workman's Club with support from local Dublin act Tribal Dance. In a reverse of the classic Spinal Tap line; "The support were so bad the crowd were still booing when we came on", it was the first time in years that I have seen The Workman's Club packed before the support had even come on stage. Walking off Dame Street and down Parliament Street, coming up towards the venue I got a tingle I usually only get during or after a show. I've seen both bands live before, so in a relative sense knew what to expect.
The difference for me tonight was a little voice piping up from my subconscious, no doubt influenced by Just Mustard's nomination for Irish Album of the Year at the Choice Prize for their debut LP Wednesday. Then there's the support slot at Malahide Castle, sharing a stage with The Cure, all coming together in the space of the last few months. Why does this matter going to a live show? To jump back to the voice in my head, it essentially said; "You do know what you are going into tonight don't you? You are going to see a band reaching the peak of their powers, these nights are rare, remember that".
At times, which is human, you question why you do this music reviewing and gig attending lark apart from the obvious reasons, passion and enjoyment, sometimes your mind and heart desire more. Looking outward beyond your own personal viewpoint, it's important that the Irish music scene as a whole can consistently move to heights the music deserves. No more lamenting great Irish bands that didn't make a ripple overseas, no more woe is me, no more low expectations, contentment with circling the local bubble. There should be more and there has to be more. A big draw in catching emerging acts live is imagining them achieving these heights in the near future, willing it to happen, it doesn't happen often, but when it does there is a collective sense of the unrealistic suddenly becoming attainable.
For me, Just Mustard summarise that scenario and feeling perfectly. As a massive fan of their music over the last number of years, I thought that their highly unique style and delivery would always have willing hearts and ears, but wondered was it too 'unpolished' for entry into the citadel of greatness, guarded by, for want of better terminology, the Music Establishment, oomph, very Orwellian! But Just Mustard didn't seem to give a shit about any of that, so why should the rest of us.
So anyway, I was going to a gig. Tribal Dance I had seen last year upstairs in Whelan's supporting Bicurious, the trio had a relatively short set due to time limitations, but made a big impact on me. The trio seem to perform like three separate acts on stage, each lost in their own world, yet simultaneously operating as a tight unit. It was great to catch a longer set this time around, but I wasn't expecting the action to be cranked up so considerably from my previous viewing. Front pair Stephen Dowling and Adam Smyth operate musically in tandem, but might as well have a screen dividing them on stage, little or no eye contact throughout their set, there's a job to be done, and it's going to be explosive. The pace was frenetic and they manically ran roughshod through each of their songs, half expecting a train to be overturned and hanging of the edge of the stage by the end of it. It was loud, measured and energised the audience perfectly for the arrival of the main act.
Adam Smyth of Tribal Dance
This was my sixth time seeing Just Mustard live, one thing guaranteed is gratification, everything else is on the table, but the distribution from the band is never the same. For a while now they have mastered transference from stage to audience, we pretty much know all of the music more or less at this point, the trick is co-opting those present, unbeknownst to themselves, into getting as close to the experience that Just Mustard want to create with their songs. It's a subliminal and almost cult-like enactment, each instrument a control mechanism, each band member pulling certain levers at exactly the right time.
For most of the show movement is kept to a minimum, the less the audience are distracted by anything other than the music the quicker they will experience hypnosis. The mechanical drone and beat of the music repeats, like a swinging pocket watch, the audience swaying to the rhythm, suddenly out of nowhere the senses are violently jolted and the crowd are confronted with a nuclear amount of distortion, drum volleys and screamed vocals. Songs 'Curtains', 'Tainted' and 'Deaf' perhaps best reflecting same. In terms of senses it's alarming, like being woken from a deep sleep and immediately slapped in the face, sounds awful, but in fact, it's life-affirming, arriving to the venue dead inside, and leaving more than alive, a power that Just Mustard wield with ever greater majesty as time moves on.
