Red Guitars: ‘Hull salutes its homecoming heroes’ - Adelphi review

‘FULL OF LOVE AND GOODWILL’: A packed Adelphi watches the Red Guitars

The Crow’s Nest, a music column by Russ Litten

I was too young to see The Red Guitars the first time round. By the time I looked old enough to get into venues they’d been and gone, leaving behind a string of iconic records and a reputation as an incendiary live act.

As far as the local music scene was concerned, they had set the bar very high indeed. The Red Guitars were a truly independent outfit who had sold 60,000 records under their own steam, made the front pages of the music press and signed to a major label, whilst keeping their musical integrity intact and diluting their political ideals not one iota.

The Red Guitars could and should have been a massive international band. Instead, they became an enduring cult influence. Which in some ways is perhaps better. Their credibility remains intact and their legacy endures.

ICONS: Red Guitars, from left, Hallam Lewis, Matt Higgins, Jeremy Kidd, Lou Duffy-Howard, and John Rowley

The Red Guitars left a body of work that stands up admirably today; a lot of it sounds like it could have been recorded yesterday. So when news broke of their reunion tour, for me it felt like something other than mere nostalgia. This was the chance to see something made real that I’d only ever previously imagined. Like bumping into the ghost of Captain Beefheart in Queens and playing him at pool.

There were no ghosts in the Adelphi on the pleasantly warm April evening The Red Guitars played. None that I could see anyway. There were plenty of familiar faces from the eighties though. About two hundred of them. Most of them were wearing delighted grins, and that was before the band had even plugged in.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen the Adelphi so full of love and goodwill.

The lights dim and The Red Guitars take to the stage to a football home-team crowd roar and an ominous electronic swirl swelling up from the PA speakers. Feedback, harmonics and the throbbing of what sounds like a space ship landing on the Adelphi roof.

Hold on …. surely it isn’t … Good Technology? Surely they aren’t going straight for the jugular with the Big Hit First tactic? The crowd stand on their collective tip toes in anticipation, Hallam wrings out that familiar broken glass riff from his Red Guitar and the place erupts.

SPECIAL EVENT: The gig quickly sold out

Then BANG! Silence. The slow pulsating tinkle of guitars interlocking, spiralling upwards. Voices raised in hymnal harmony. “They got ways to dislocate a culture …” Lou kick-starts that motorcycle bass line and we’re off into Marimba Jive and the place erupts again.

It’s a beautiful, jubilant noise. They sound fantastic, tight and sleek and powerful and they look great as well. Lead singer Jerry has a superb Jesus hairdo and does a kind of gentle, lost in music dance, like a supply teacher joining in at the edges of the school disco.

Guitarists Hallam, John and Josh look like the missing members of the Bad Seeds, all grizzled good looks, tasteful beards and garish shirts. Drummer Matt is effortlessly commanding from the back, driving the African-flecked rhythms with dashing verve and aplomb.

Jeremy Kidd and Lou Duffy-Howard

Lou lights up the entire world with her sunbeam smile and swooping heartbeat bass lines. There’s another chap crouched at the back with headphones and some electronic iPod type affair. I only notice him when I take refuge at the side of the stage in a bid to escape the heat of the crowd.

He’s bashing a tambourine and singing along. He looks delighted. We all are. It’s The Red Guitars and they’re doing all the hits.

Shaken Not Stirred sounds like Edwyn Collins jamming with Tom Waits. Sting In The Tale feels like the soundtrack to a distinctly off-kilter spy film, one replete with dark looming shadows and sea-sick camera work.

John Rowley

Slow to Fade is a long dragged up sob of a song that builds and builds from delicate, tentative beginnings before shifting gear upwards into a colossal tower of weeping, bittersweet sound.

Steeltown and Fact have their roots in the eighties, but their subject matter is timeless and the power of their delivery puts a proper chill up the crowd’s collective spine. Take the profit out of war indeed.

Remote Control, Heartbeat Go! and Dive up the African Township vibe to prime Talking Heads territory, with added northern slather and salt courtesy of Jerry’s vivid cinematic lyrics.

It’s obvious that each and every one of these songs has been polished with love, care and attention. The crowd have voted with their feet and danced themselves into a sweaty, delirious heap.

Hallam Lewis

Finally, an electrifying Good Technology is served up in full, and the jubilant Paris France bring the show to a close. The homecoming heroes embrace and Hull salutes them.

This didn’t feel like your usual nostalgia trip. And I know I’m not alone in hoping that the joyful energy sparked by this reunion drives The Red Guitars towards more gigs and recordings.

New material has been rumoured. We can only hope that it happens. In the meantime, dig out your copy of Slow to Fade and have another listen to these fabulous songs.

I was too young to hear them live the first time round, but The Red Guitars at Hull Adelphi made me feel like a teenager again.