Bilk, O2 Academy 2, Birmingham review - Essex rock'n'rollers blast into the weekend

Sol Abrahams, singer and guitarist for Essex rock’n’rollers Bilk, was suffering from a bit of guitar trouble in Birmingham on Friday evening. By the time the band was ready to power through “On It”, from new album Essex, Drugs and Rock and Roll, he was already on his third or fourth instrument, the last one having literally fallen apart in his hands.

Not that this put any kind of dampener on his Pete Townsend-like flailing right arm as he blasted through the power chords of “RNR”, “F Up” and “Be Someone”. His band were also serious about being here to promote their new disc of post-Oasis and Jake Bugg-flavoured rock’n’roll, which thankfully manages to sidestep Liam Gallaghers’ vacuous wanna be hardman nonsense but keeps the cocky attitude, of that there was no doubt. For, despite insistent chanting from a large group of pissed-up blokes, there was to be no space on the setlist for old song, “Billy Big Bollocks”. Instead, there was the speedy “Slag”, acoustic sing-along “Skidmark”, lively pub rock of “Bad News” and the hectic “CM2” with its incendiary drum solo ending, which all had everyone present paying total attention.

Abrahams clearly knows his audience and leaned towards his microphone as the band hit the stage mumbling “You’re going to jump around, yeah?”, as if there was any doubt. That said, he wasn’t aloof towards them and there was also an instruction “If anyone falls over, pick ‘em up, yeah?” – which was observed throughout the set until things finally came to end with the bar room blues of “Band Life Blues”. Abrahams and tattooed bassist Luke Hare and powerhouse drummer Harry Gray were soon swaggering back on the stage though for an encore of the biting “Fashion” and the barnstorming “Daydreamer” from their self-titled first album – which were more than enough to bring things to a righteous close with some seriously exuberant rock’n’roll attitude, as the venue again lit up and exploded.

There’s been a bit of soul searching of late in the music industry about teenagers seemingly only going to gigs in arenas by artists with well-developed social media followings and the audiences in smaller venues just being populated by Radio 6 Dads – who spend their evenings standing absolutely still, pint in hand and staring out any bands who they go to see. This certainly didn’t describe Bilk’s crowd in Birmingham’s diminutive O2 Academy 2 this weekend, as young lads and girls threw themselves about in the mosh pit with total abandon from the first song until the band stepped off the stage to man their merch stall. Not that the crowd wasn’t pretty diverse and, as the house lights came up and the audience shuffled towards the exit, we bumped into one of the older fans who had been joining in the mosh pit antics.

“I haven’t done this in 30 years” he said, “but if I drop dead tomorrow, fuck it”. Which is as good, if not particularly eloquent a comment in favour of getting down to some live rock’n’roll as you’ll get from anyone.

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