Crowd surfing at a folk concert, surely not?
It has been a while since I have been out to a gig in Amsterdam and even though it was pouring with rain, I am glad that I went.
It seems that I have a little curse when it comes to gigs and that is the supports acts are usually pretty woeful when I am around. The height of this occured a while ago when a local band was called in to fill the role. The the lead singer wore a meatloaf fancy dress costume and the rest of the so called band made noise similar to that of flogging a cat attached to a megaphone. You can imagine the result was not pleasing to the eyes or ears. But, I am glad to report that the support for Mr Turner, namely ‘Jaako and Jay’ were not quite on the same level as the afore mentioned ‘so called band’. But they certainly have some work to do to gain some more depth in their deliverance of their material. it was difficult for me to distinguish one song from another. They were fun and had good energy, but they definitely need more refinement. Thankfully it was not long before they went and Frank took to the stage.
Frank Turner is a cross over artist. He has a firm foot hold in the traditional folk of yesteryear but has all but managed to escape the box into the less restrictive world of Punk. That is apart from the banjo wielding, jumper donned bearded guy hanging on to his left foot. All of which bears a parallel with a certain other Londoner by the name of Billy Bragg who didn’t do too bad out of a similar experience.
From the offset it was clear that Frank meant business, by belting out a couple of catchy uptempo tunes from the album. He was even kind enough to give an audience member his debut on the harmonica with their very own solo. This turned out to be a very good present for the newest but shortest serving member of Frank turner’s band as it was also his birthday, an event which was the first episode in a theme that appeared again during the evening.
Frank then decided to take the evening up a notch and raised the temperature with some surprisingly well known tunes. Well known to the audience that is, as it seems that the entire audience were well versed in the musical and songwriting ability of the young man on stage. So much so, that even Frank himself was amazed at the turnout.
Frank then felt it was time to continue the Birthday theme by presenting his manager with a birthday cake on stage. The customary song to which we all know the words followed and everyone gladly joined in. This set the tone for the rest of the evening and as birthday parties go, this was a damn good one.
Frank followed up with waves of joyous well constructed intelligent tunes and ballads of great sustenance which all built to a crescendo of the anthemic ‘Photosynthesis’. The crowd responded in kind and each song was met with even more rapturous applause then the last.
Frank gave it all on stage. The atmosphere was one of jubilance and Frank manage to raise the temperament to the point where stage diving and crowd surfing became the norm. It was almost reminiscent of a local folk festival where the banjos were all replaced with heavily distorted guitars and all the town’s people had turned up after being held up in the pub for some liquid refreshment.
I haven’t enjoyed a gig as much as this in the melkweg for quite a while. So if you have always had the urge to stage dive at a folk concert, then here is your chance. Go see Frank Turner! I am sure he will be delighted to oblige.