THIS IS NOT A REVIEW OF
BOB LOG III + THOMAS TRUAX
Live at Night & Day Cafe, Manchester. Sunday 4th March 2018.
What does a person do when they are confronted with a man in a suit playing a drying machine drainage pipe... Followed by another man dressed in a golden onesie, wearing a racing helmet, playing steel guitar whilst floating in an inflatable boat across all of our heads!?!?!
For the last few years I've been an absolute gig addict with no genres off bounds. I've seen Test Dept. pouring oil to trigger a grandfather clock to play a drumbeat. I've seen Botanist make Black Metal using a harmonium and hammered dulcimer, whilst dressed up as trees! I've seen a man swallow a microphone and make beats by patting his belly! I thought I'd seen it all... Until this fateful evening!
This is NOT a review of Bob Log III & Thomas Truax, because nothing I can possibly write will accurately describe the music and the experience that I have witnessed...!!!
Tonight's first one man band was New Yorker Thomas Truax, performing in an elegant suit. Bizarre curios adorned the stage beside him, including Mother Superior, his home made drum machine. This complex contraption was made from a bicycle wheel attached to miniature snares and kick drum. By adjusting the spokes he could set up different looped beats, triggered from a pedal at his feet.
Thomas Truax began his set fairly conventionally, opening with a vocal driven piece on his Hornicator, a lopped off gramophone speaker with a microphone inside. Using loop pedals he was able to layer cavernous, reverberated vocals and then sing over these bizarre loops. Truax then took the crazy levels down a notch, showcasing a steel guitar, performing a couple of Americana flavoured ballads. His energy and stage presence was roaring as he launched into the crowd with his guitar and told stories between songs that had the packed out crowd in fits of laughter.
The finale of his set got really bizarre, bringing out an instrument devised from a drying machine drainage pipe. He attached a cable to the pillar at the side of the stage, plucking it at different lengths to change the key, whilst blowing into said drainage pipe to create otherworldly sounds. His big finale saw Night & Day plunged into darkness as he performed 'Beehive Heart' ("Bob Log III asked me to play this one tonight, because he needed it to be in his head") with spinning, neon lit glasses.
Nothing I can say here can accurately describe the amount of strangeness and uniqueness that Thomas Truax created. He not only invented new instruments, but created sounds and vibes I'd never experienced in the flesh before. His confidence and charm was absolutely effervescent. Go see this man live, or at least listen to his music and watch some YouTube videos!!! 9/10.
BOB LOG III
Bob Log III is an absolute wild man, fingering and twanging his guitar with no mercy! The slightly ragged and distorted sound of his guitar occasionally dabbled into noisy and discordant territory, adding to the Bluegrass madness. His vocals also were distorted and obscured, most likely by his racing helmet, often unintelligible, yet adding a weirdness to the overall cacophony of bizarre sounds. Because he was twanging away on his guitar, and drumming with both feet at the same time, IN A RACING HELMET, his playing wasn't always on point, something losing his timing on the beats, but it just added more charm and honesty to his performance.
Bob Log III's biggest tour-de-force though was his magnificent stage presence. He really got the crowd involved, jumping into an inflatable boat and sailing across peoples heads as he twanged that guitar! He even filled a child's paddling pool and dog bowl fool of booze. He played with a sheer joy. "Wow Manchester, you're lucky, I've never played that song so good in my life!!!" If I could see the face behind the mask, I'm sure it would have had a huge grin on it. Night & Day became privy to one of the most fun and bizarre hoedowns of all time! Once again, this is an act and a performance that no matter how hard I try and describe, I can never clearly sum up unless you go and see him for yourself in the flesh, which I HIGHLY recommend you do! 9/10.
