Valentines, my arse
18 Feb 2000

Birmingham's pop kids demonstrated their tremendous powers of discernment last Saturday by eschewing the dubious trappings of 'Valentine's weekend' for the true sound of romance that is The Regulars.

Credit where it certainly is due, however, to the first two bands, Coaster and Nkisi, for packing the place out from the start. The latter are especially worthy of mention for an admirably tight strutting of their dramatic, sit-up-and-listen, Curve-type stuff on their debut live show.

The Regs kicked off with forthcoming single Lie down and fight, which raised a little applause, but the biggest cheer of the night was for the pop song about pop songs This is the sound - on its first ever live performance. Such was its impact that Mr Richard Banner was moved to join the band on stage at its conclusion and shake the singer's hand. Though to be fair, he had been drinking since five o'clock.

In another pleasant surprise, several former members of Birmingham's much-mourned experimental twinkly lo-fi pop seven-piece (phew) Novak showed up to see The Regulars, and declared themselves glad to have done so. It's things like this that make it all worthwhile.

Meanwhile, Jackie Zoot, standing to the side of the stage as the set drew to a close, narrowly escaped death by tambourine as the instrument mysteriously flew off at the end of Once you get past Habrough. Thankfully Jackie recovered her composure sufficiently to nominate October we take it back as her top tune from the set.

And finally, for making possible the true highlight of the evening at the apres-gig back at Pete's house, The Regulars would like to pay tribute to Bell-a-Pizza of Smethwick. Never was dough so sublime.

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