THE FUTUREHEADS / NOVACUB | LIVE REVIEW
The Globe, Cardiff, Tue 28 May
It’s a measure of how far Bloc Party have fallen that while former drummer Matt Tong is now plying his trade in politically charged art-punk-gospel outfit Algiers, his replacement Louise Bartle and (more worryingly) guitarist and founder member Russell Lissack are fronting Novacub, who appear to have been nurtured in a lab by Britain’s Got Talent producers, Topshop executives and major-label cokehead A&R men trying and failing to imagine what ‘indie-pop’ might sound like. They are astonishingly, cringingly awful – not least because what Bartle introduces as their “angry, punk song” couldn’t fight its way out of a piss-soaked paper bag. It’s the oversized stuffed bear propped up by the drumkit I feel sorry for, having to put up with this night after night. Its unsmiling mouth and dead-eyed stare are a cry for help.
“Turn off that noughties rubbish”, says The Futureheads’ Barry Hyde to the DJ with a knowing smirk as he walks on from the wings, cutting off actual grown men singing along to Razorlight. The self-deprecating irony may raise a laugh but is entirely unnecessary. The quartet – whom local rivalries dictate I must refer to as the best thing to come out of Sunderland since the A19 to Newcastle – were cut from a different (and altogether better) cloth than their contemporaries, taking their name from a Flaming Lips album and creating barbershop new wave punk that was far too sharp and smart to be sullied by association with the post-Libertines crowd.
The sight of Hyde back on stage alongside his drummer brother Dave, guitarist Ross Millard and bassist David ‘Jaff’ Craig is not one many of us expected to ever see again. After a superb self-titled breakthrough debut, a classic difficult second album and three further LPs on their own Nul label, The Futureheads disappeared without trace. A 2016 interview in the Guardian gave some context: Hyde’s belated diagnosis with bipolar disorder and a “severe breakdown” that began in 2010 and lasted for three years. Solo album Malody was a cathartic attempt to make sense of his extraordinary experiences.
Blistering comeback single Jekyll, which kicks off tonight’s set (albeit after a brief tease of Hounds Of Love), is presumably also a nod to Hyde’s struggles, performed with an aggression and at a volume that has some people scampering to the back of the room. Another new song, Across The Border, is a vein-popping Millard rant, Jaff observing that it’s the angriest he’s ever seen his bandmate, and a third carries the finger-jabbing title Listen Little Man.
The new material might be fuelled by fury, but their comic between-song repartee remains among the best in the business. When Hyde confesses, “Last time I was in Cardiff, I was marched out of a guitar shop”, Millard and Jaff instantly respond by quoting Wayne’s World: “No Stairway!” Later, Jaff reveals that on a pre-gig trip to the Albany the frontman discovered his natural talent at skittles, scoring highly enough to make it onto the pub team. A strangulated request for Danger Of The Water prompts Hyde to announce “Someone’s medication’s run out”; another shout-out for A To B is met with Jaff’s admission, “I couldn’t play that one back in 2004, mate”.
Decent Days And Nights and Meantime are a reminder of how fresh and invigorating their debut was, but we’re also served the choicest cuts from News And Tributes (Skip To The End, the perfect if unlikely marriage of Wire and AC/DC); This Is Not The World (The Beginning Of The Twist); and The Chaos (Struck Dumb and The Connector). Best of all, though, are Ticket and Carnival Kids from 2003 EP 1-2-3-Nul!, whose exhilarating, jerky eccentricity the band have sadly lost over time. Hounds Of Love inevitably rounds off the evening, but it’s arguably upstaged by another cover (and another 1-2-3-Nul! track), The Television Personalities’ A Picture Of Dorian Gray.
Given their history, I don’t say this lightly: it’s great to have them back.
words BEN WOOLHEAD