Latitude part the third: scions of indie

Minor Victories

On the Radio Six stage fist at Sunday lunchtime are indie supergroup, Minor Victories. Stuart Braithwaite, guitarist with Mogwai and MinorVictories said the band has all the good elements from everyone's bands, meaning also Rachel Goswell's Slowdive, Justin Lockey's Editors and James Lockey's HandHeld Cine Club (no, me neither).  Now, Cultureberg looks the world in the eye and shoegazing passed us by, but I have no grounds to challenge Mr Braithwaite as MV pump out a very appealing sound that fits my thesis that many bands that please have both an indiduality whilst maintaining a tradition, subtly tweaking a genre.   Their host bands have constructed Sonic Cathedrals of Sound, and MV are a Sonic Sagrada Familiar.  Breathy, somewhat gossamer vocals -check.  Pummelling drums-check.  Screeing sheets of guitar noise - all present and correct.  For a band who shared ideas and constructed songs without ever all being in the same room, the sound is cohesive and has a distinct identity, both muscular and crepuscular. Paradoxically, there is no feeling of phoning parts in or writing by committee, with Ms Goswell stood stock still centre stage as the waves of sound undulate and reverberate around her.  Minor Victories, then, a tangible success.  Some stuff from the past, some of what's on your mind today and you've a juggernaut for the festival season.  Big thumbs up from the early risers.


Steve Mason

I'd lost touch with Mr Mason after The Beta Band, but Cultureberg's Fife associate The Crafty Crailler caught a recent show and was enthusiastic so I attended his mid afternoon performance.  Unfamiliar though I am of any biographical info, though aware his new album is a return to form an emotional equilibrium, I was unsure what to expect.  What we were treated to was a direct set where Mr Mason's personality reverberated with an engaging clarity.  Like The Beta Band, there's a winning scallydeilic component and simple, oft repeated lyrics, almost adult nursery rhyme.  Mr Mason prowls the stage shedding clothes - he first appears in anorak, goggles plus fours and boots.  He has the air of one who may have succumbed to therapeutic input only to emerge much clearer about what he is angry about rather than emerging becalmed and beatific.  He is clearly, in the words of one of the best songs, ""alive".  At the end of the set he wishes the audience peace, this is in contrast to the fate he wished Tony Blair in the song 'Throw him on the fire' or the singalong he led the tent in, where use of fists and a baseball bat were invoked.  What kind of peace he has found, it is avert engaged and active one, and Mr Mason clearly had the tent with him for the lion's share of the set.  He also had the best set of plus fours spotted at Latitude.  Not practical in the heat or the lights perhaps but I think Cultureberg can safely assume Mr Mason seldom takes the easy route.