Rubbish weather outside, but inside the Electric Ballroom in Camden, London, we were waiting for the very good and sometimes random stylings of Evil Scarecrow with from Ten Foot Wizard.
Walking out to that weird off-key version of “Never Gonna Give You Up” before hitting us with some big riffs and heavy rhythms, Ten Foot Wizard were a very good way to start the night.
There was plenty to enjoy with lots of different sounds and styles being pumped out. Tracks like “Namaste Dickhead” are a good example of that, with crunchy grooves and toe-tapping verses twinned with a nasty fuzzy chorus and black metal style vocals. “How Low Can You Go” revved things up with some fast and furious riffage which got people down the front dancing and the whole vibe felt like we were in for a party mood tonight!
A small theremin, a megaphone, and a microphone stand shaped like a flamingo made an appearance for the last song, “Covered in Tits”, which offers a great opportunity for the crowd to shout the words “I’m covered in tits”. A great start to the night.
Evil Scarecrow delivered exactly as expected. Lots of stage props, extra characters on stage (like Link and Chun Li during “Last Level Boss”) crowd participation and a great live set.
“The Ballad of Brother Pain” offered a nice mid-set ballad, with trademark lyrical styling that much of the crowd was happy to sing along to as a snow machine peppered a portion of the front row. The crowd were also required to provide “Arctic wind” sound effects encouraged by Dr. Rabid Hell’s “wind stick”. There was wind in the Arctic way, and also the farctic(?) way, because Evil Scarecrow are a very sensible band.
Of course they played the 10 minute title track from the new album, Chapter IV: Antartarctica, which if I wrote about I could easily fill the word count as there was a lot going on on stage, including sword wielding guitarists, giant slugs and epic solos. Crowd participation was required again for “Cosmos Goth Moth Gong”, with syllables of the chorus being split between opposing sides of the crowd.
Two people were called up on stage and the crowd pitted against each other with an “old school mother fucking dance”-off for “Red Riding Hood”. In a peculiar twist, the pair on stage ended their dance off session with a marriage proposal. Kind of sweet, but also kind of random.
“Crabulon” followed to finish off the set, which went down very well indeed. There were plenty of shuffling and crab claws being imitated by a very mobile crowd. The word “EGGS!” was needed to spur on an encore, which began with “Polteghost” from the new album. Many raised fists were thrust in the air once again for the final song with the added steps of turning anticlockwise (which seemed to be either direction) for “Hurricanado”… And an earthquake.
The pit really got going to maximum effect to cap off a brilliant night of good vibes and great music.
Images by Shotison Media
