Ginger and the Sonic Circus - Gig Review

Ginger and the Sonic Circus

This Ginger's new site for his latest solo project.

Latest Album (below) available now.

The Garage Islington London 27th January 2006.

We got into London around dinner time and went to do a bit of site seeing before checking in at our hotel in Islington. We headed to the gig around 5.30pm and after a short tube ride to Islington went for a couple of beers in a local pub. Then me and the Missus went out into the snow, as it was snowing by this time although only a little.We got in the queue, in the cold, for about 6.45pm, outside The Garage. Doors opened around 7.05 and we headed towards the front of the stage and staked our spot. I got us some drinks in, and bought a T-Shirt before the 1st act came on, which to our surprise was a troupe of Can Can girls and not a support band as we had expected.

This was then followed shortly after by a guy sticking nails up his nose and swords down his throat. He invited a Sue Pollard lookalike up on to the stage to help with the nail stunt. He then invited my wife up on to the stage to help out with a stunt involving sticking a balloon up a nostril and blowing it up with a balloon pump, up the other nostril. He got her to stand at the front of the stage while she did this so she could not see what he was doing. She imagined from the faces she was pulling, that it was something really disgusting. For the final stunt he put a dagger down his throat to which some one shouted ' Do It Sideways', which got a big laugh. He invited more people to give some abuse which they did. He then picked on some guy on the front who he said laughed at anything! Anyway the 3rd act came on and did a bit of a strip routine and proceeeded to put on a metal crotch piece and then turned a grinder on herself. From what I heard though the act was cut short as it was a danger to the audience.

Then on to the main act and what we had all come to see. Weall waiting to see who was going to be in Ginger's band. The sound of the introduction tape playing GTT sent chills down my neck. The band came on and burst straight into Ugly from the new album. Most noticable person was Random Jon Poole and the fact that he pointed straight at my wife in recogonition of knowing her from the Marquee a year or so earlier. He came on wearing a black suit sand sunglasses and some bum fluff on his cheek.

Jase Edwards from Wolfsbane fame was on 2nd guitar.Hardly recognisable now with the beard and the enormous size of him. The drummer Steve( who some thought was Steve Danger from Wolfsbane also) I didn't know. Incidently Steve Danger was actually there as a roadie and was the guy with no hear and pink wristbands. The two backing singers I didn't know, and didn't really stick out as anything special and were purely there for backing vocals and not eye candy. And I learnt after that Luis on keyboards was the guy who played on Ginger's album also (Check out the sleeve notes for Keep It Cool).

Songwise Ginger was here to promote the new album and that is what we got, bar a few songs at the end. Ginger was on top form chatting between songs. I noticed also that there was no alcohol on stage, only bottles of water and they never smoked until nearly the end of the set.. Ginger looked quite healthy and happy compared to seeing him on last years acoustic tour. He seems very excited about forthcoming events coming up throughout this year... Tour, Record company etc.

Ten Flaws Down was my favourite song of the night, about half way through the set, and was made all the more exciting by Conny Bloom joining the band half way through it and then leading into Sonic Shake. He stayed with them on and off then till the end of the gig. Dunno if Conny is a permanent fixture in this new band though. Surprised at how similar in image style, Ginger and Conny are. Almost like two brothers up there.

The Man Who Cheated Death , surprised Ginger, when everyone took over singing the 1st verse. This is out of context here, but it struck me that it was a Robbie Williams moment as in his song, Angels, when the audience takes over. Ginger said he was surprised everyone knew the song as the album had only been out a couple of weeks. Did he forget it was available on MySpace last year and he played during his acoustic tour last year also?

The evening seemed quite short though, even with a 10.30pm curfue. They were finished well before that though. The band encored 1st off, with some of what Ginger called, his favourite songs. Starting with David Bowies, Boys keep Swinging, followed by Nazereth's Love Hurt's which sounded a little out of tune. Ending the 1st encore with Elvis Costello's Pump It Up.

The Audience then sang Don't Worry Bout Me, which the band joined in on. The night was finished with the only Wildhearts song of the night 29 x the Pain. Brilliant night and the volume was not as loud as expected as I could still hear when leaving the venue. The audience were not as rowdy as a Wildhearts audience but then maybe the Ginger style on this new album is not that kind of in yer face rock either?