8 - The Michigan Daily Summer Weekly - Wednesday, July 8,1992
Men and their
beefy guitars
Catherine Wheel andthe Soup Drag-
ons rocked hard last Wednesday at
St. Andrew's in Detroit. Catherine
Wheel churned, and even the fluffy
bandwagonjumpers, the Soup Drag-
ons beefed up their pop lite. The
best fireworks were definitely on
stage, and not over the Detroit
River. Rob Dickinson of Catherine
Wheel (left), and Jim McCulloch
(right) of the Soup Dragons repre-
sented their Brit popland well.
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Continued from page 6
Gilbert)firstmeets titillating Ivy (Drew
Banymore), the most right-on adjec-
tive she uses is "scangey." Scheming
Ivy worms her way into lonely Coop's
family, seducing her middle-age-
crisised father (Tom Skerritt) with sex,
her invalid mother (Cheryl Ladd) with
her energy, and taking over Coop's
home life with her friendship. Because
the story is told through Coop's voice-
overs,youneverquitelearnwhatmakes
Ivy tick beyond her revealing com-
ments about her own family (and even
the stories about a dead mother and
Summer
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father who never gave her anything CHARLATANS
might be lies). What Ivy does in the
movie's present, however, is enough Continued from page 6
fodder for this'90s B-movie take-off of doing the endlessjams of Fool's Gold,
the meaningful black comedy. Though they probably would've sounded like
the pacing of Poison Ivy is sometimes the new improved Charlatans.
slow, ex-Detroiter Katt Shea Ruben Burgess' understated vocals, qui-
almost flawlessly balances the vamp- edy singing about dissatisfactory life
'n-camp of Ivy's penetration into the situations, match the emotional riffs
household with such thoughtful detail and textured rhythms.
shotsasIvyinCoop'smother'sslightly- Burgessexplainshislyricalinspira-
too-large clothing. The ultimate cheesy tion as "Observations. They're about
teen flick line Ivy delivers, "Fuck you people, and me, about other people,
with a limp dick," nicely sums this aboutme again and aboutother people
summer's appeal. Iwouldhavethought.Peopleingeneral
Poison Ivy is playing at Showcase. and what people leave behind like dirt
-Annette Petruso and bad sort of hideous things like ruin
and things. The way people do ruin
things."
RobCollins'keyboards work within
the songs to add to these effects, unlike
C l ssmost keyboards which seem to be
slapped on top as a catchy novelty.
From the distorted organ-like bits that
open "Weirdo" and "Can't Even Be
Bothered" to the rippled keyboard parts
throughout "Chewing Gum Weekend,"
E x am s Collins' lines fill out Between 10th and
11th's character.
At St. Andrew's, the only band
member that moved besides Mr. Dis-
play was Collins, who bobbed up and
SAT Classes begin: down, totally digging his instrument.
ednesday, July 8th As on the Charlatans' albums, Collins'
lines gave the Charlatans the umph that
makes them different and fun. Burgess
RE Classes begin: may be the charming face, but Collins
defines the Charlatans sound. The or-
hursday, July 9th gan was mixed heavy, and it added an
edge,afeeling associated with freelove
and the '60s that the audience ate up in
CAT Classes begin: the heat.
uesday, July 14th Of course, Burgess assumed (and
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got) most of the attention. His vocals
held up well in concert, but that didn't
seem really important. His appearance
-long dark hair cut fashionably, well-
defined face, boney pale chest peeking
out from a stylish retro shirt, and long
fingers flayling; his tenderness for the
'[My lyrics are] about
people, and me, about other
people, about me again and
about other people I would
have thought. People in
general and what people
leave behind...'
- Tim Burgess, lead,
The Charlatans
audience-giving thirsty fans acupof
his water, for example;andhis undying
enthusiasm for his own band's music
jutted his body 'round non-stop during
theset,definedwhy theconcertworked
well. Burgess fed off of the audiences
unconditional frenzy, and gave them
something to get excited about in re-
turn.
But drummerJohn Brookes told the
New Musical Express in November,
"There's a lot of people in the music
business that hate us - because they
hate to think a band like us is so impor-
tant."
Burgess agreed, "Yeah." Why?
"Because we know that we're doing
something right. And it just seems to
me that nobody else has a clue. Then
again, there's no reason to feel sorry for
yourself so I don't really know why he
saidthat. 'Cause weneverfeelsorry for
ourselves."
Makenomistake though, The Char-
latans are a delightful pure pop band
liveandonrecord,notblissed-outwashy
guitars. "I don't like them groups at
all," says Burgess. "I think they're re-
ally blank. Really pointless. They think
they're being rebels ... They're prob-
ably just middle-class wankers. Can't
be dealing with people whining about
sexual traumas." Just it seems, his own
version of dreamy. hver irrationality.
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1100 Sout
The Wolfgang Press look (Mick Allen, left, and Andrew Gray, right) like
G.E. Smith and the Saturday Night Live band at St. Andrew's last
Thursday. Allen's strong-armed vocals and strong-boned face were
reminiscent-of Tom Waits-sans-grain.