Review - Zanicka + Mother Cat + Lab64 @ Green Square Hotel 20 Aug 99
"It takes a lot of guts to
get up and do a solo set", saluted Jason of Mother
Cat toward Lab64, whose well-sung but
out-of-tune opening set was our third greeting from the Green Square Hotel. The
first was five Japanese in blue overalls and white galoshes, probably some Uni
stunt, the second being the Door Nazi from Hell. Unperturbed, we stuck around
through Lab64: a guy who sounds like a mix of Dave (Megadeth)
Mustaine and James
(Metallica) Hetfield
with a real dark view of life, one-armed hecklers, learn-on-the-job sound guys,
and a small but loyal and gothic-styled following.
Our live introduction to Mother
Cat came after a lengthy set-up break. We were warned earlier that
while they love to rock it up in the 'burbs like the rest of them, this was
going to be a more laid back affair. What followed during the next forty
minutes was a combination of late 60s and early 70s rock and blues and 90s
hindsight, with smatterings of Allman
Bros, Skyhooks,
Ross
Wilson/Daddy Cool, Cream/Clapton,
Doobies,
Thorpie,
Sabbath,
Zeppelin,
as well as Pearl
Jam, Red
Hot Chili Peppers, Tea Party,
Grrrumble,
and the promised quieter moments as available on their current 'Out Of The Bag' demo.
Stand-outs from tonight's set
included the Micky
Dolenz/Don
Henley inspired It Takes Time
with Pat
on vocals with the Phil
Collins headset, the beautiful 'yes we can do them live too!'
harmonies on No Release and the hard rockin' closer Mr Universe. The
sound-guy wasn't as cruel to them as they were to themselves with the excessive
volume for the size of the room, but FOH-gear failure let them down just as
badly. Tim (is that an intentional Frank
Zappa look?) could probably do with a little more top-end in the Gibbo-driver as well. Mother
Cat are a top band to catch in a good room.
We couldn't stick around to watch
Zanicka
- apparently Satan's Gatekeeper was from their camp. We'll wait for the
movie...