Dinosaur Pile Up – Birmingham Hare and Hounds – 10-10-10

I arrived at the venue at 8 thinking I was an hour late and would be seeing bands straight away. Instead, I walked into a almost empty room to some chill out music, I would have thought I was in the wrong venue if it wasn’t for the words ‘Mona Lisa’ taped to the amps at the back of the stage. It was a strange feeling being at a rock gig with one of the most happening bands of the moment playing but the room is quiet and I feel like I’m actually going to be in for a slow night.

It turned out I was on time and that the doors where actually at 8 not 7, so I was in for a wait until the first band who I thought was going to be a band called Rase but again I was wrong and it turned out to be a guy and his guitar called Geordie Blake. Geordie gets on stage and jumps into his indie folk sound with slight tones of rock into the mix. His wispy gravelly voice fits the guitar but its missing something.... his band Shana Tova. He plays a half hour set that just sounds like the same song over and over. The audience isn’t really into it except for a few people who turn out to be the next support band.

Black Heart Generator, get on stage and thrash about to lively angsty indie rock. The guitars and bass are heavily distorted with very tinny cymbals which are loud enough to blow your ears out. They let on that both them and Geordie where asked to cover earlier that day which makes sense why the greatly energetic Turbowolf are not playing. No-one says why the two original support bands are not here and it’s such a disappoint that their not as the two new supports just don’t do it for me, they alienate the audience with private jokes but to be fair they have come in at the last minute so you can’t expect to be blown away.

Whatever has made the two supports not show up hasn’t affected Dinosaur Pile Up as they’re here and ready to rock. They get on stage and instantly get a reaction with everyone moving closer to the stage. The crowd has built up and the once dead room has a decent amount of people but is no-where near to being full, which is surprising but as a sign on their amps say ‘Sunday nights are boring’. The audience are not fully rocking out just a nice head nod throughout their set, the band on the other hand, the bassist especially, get into the gig and mosh around and remind me of an early Ash, full of energy and passion. They play a good set and surprisingly play their currently radio heavy song ‘Mona Lisa’ early into their set, which still doesn’t get the crowd motivated enough to jump around.

All in all it was a disappointing night, with Dinosaur Pile Up doing just enough to make it enjoyable. I do think that on another night all the bands would rock your socks off but unfortunately it wasn’t tonight.