Black Lips’ live shows have gained a notorious reputation for on-stage vomiting and urination, rioting and setting instruments on fire. Playing the guitar using his penis as a plectrum is not unknown by one, ahem, member. The Atlanta four piece were forced to cancel a recent tour of India and flee the country when the local police took umbrage with them shedding their clothes during gigs.
Black Lips
“Life is like a box of chocolates”, declares bassist and lead singer Jared Swilley as the band take to the stage. And like the proverbial chocolates you never know what you are going to get with a Black Lips gig.
The intimately-quaint Deaf Institute is wall to wall with sweaty bodies jumping around in a frenzy as soon as the band takes to the stage. The throng become increasingly animated as the night progresses with a constant wave of crowd surfers flooding on to the stage, much to the considerable chagrin of the security.
The venue is ill-suited to deal with such scenes but the bouncer flings fans from the stage with a maniacal grin, clearly relishing his job a little too much. “This bass is worth more than my life. If you damage it I’ll tell this man to bash your head in,” Swilley tells the audience with a cheeky smile.
Now on their fifth album (‘200 Million Thousand’ out March) the band rips through the hour-long set with relish, exuding an enjoyment which rubs off on the crowd. They obviously love their job and it shows in the music as well as the performance.
The Lips describe themselves as “flower-punk”, a tag that fits with the hippie-orientated sound of their primal garage-rock.
There are elements of the Pixies, The Stooges, Ramones, and the early albums of The Clash whose last gang in town attitude is evident in abundance. What sets them apart is the mixing of this punk ethos with the jingle jangle sounds of The Byrds and, weirdly, Beach Boy harmonies.
‘Bad Kids’ is gleefully childish and the swamp rockabilly guitars and bass are more than a little reminiscent of Elvis and Johnny Cash. The atonal caterwauling of ‘Starting Over’ is superb, sounding like The Velvet Underground fronted by the Happy Mondays’ Shaun Ryder.
The sheer amount of different musical genres on display, and the proficiency in which the Lips move between them, is astonishing and never more striking than in the psychedelic wig-out that brings the set to a close.
Their performance is made all the more enjoyable by virtue of the spaghetti-western outfit of the guitarist. Sporting a poncho, peasant-style hat and a splendid gun-toting-bandit moustache he ends the night playing guitar while running along the top of the bar.
The ramshackle, seemingly effortless, brilliance belies the talent and effort behind the Black Lips. There is no nudity, no vomiting and no setting instruments ablaze but there doesn’t need to be. The adoring crowd scream for an encore but Black Lips stick to the age-old formula of ‘always leave them wanting more’.
Edward Devlin