This is an excerpt of an article written by Tom Girard


Kings
Kings

Back in November Havoc Events revived themselves after a few years away from organising shows with a metal night at The Fermain Tavern harking back to their former glory days. At the time though they were already saying they had plans to put on shows with a broader appeal and for their second event they certainly delivered on that.

Split across two days Havoc staged essentially the same gig twice, back at The Tav, with the Friday night being an under-18s show and the Saturday an over-18s one giving everyone who wanted to the chance to catch the show which spanned the pop of Kings to the grunge of Coastal Fire Dept with rockers Vice and solo acoustic singer-songwriter Kiya Ashton representing the younger end of the scene.

Kiya Ashton
Kiya Ashton

Kiya started the night off, a year on to the day from her solo debut, with her most relaxed outing yet.

Mixing tracks from her Sweet Decadence EP, with new songs and a few covers Kiya was impressively unfazed by the more easily distracted older audience than she’s used to playing to and she did seem to quiet all but the most chatty at the back of the venue at points.

The expanded set list saw her show a broader range with her playing while little things like smoother transitions between her playing styles really showed how far she’s come over the past year.

Closing out on an impressive version of The Cranberries classic Zombie, Kiya set the bar high for the other acts to follow.

Tiegan and Jessie of Vice
Tiegan and Jessie of Vice

From the off it was clear that Vice have found a fuzzier side that their sound has long been searching for and they certainly impressed with it here.

While they still have moments that are a bit low energy compared to what it feels like they are searching for, they finally seemed to be finding their own personality, particularly on the couple of original songs they included that also brought a higher and less forced power to the performance.

Guitarist Tiegan Thornborrow was a particular highlight tonight as she showed that she’s pushing her playing on in a way that’s making her a joint focal point for the band alongside singer Jessie Birch.

While made up of more experience musicians, as a band Coastal Fire Dept have, like Vice, also spent the last couple of years establishing themselves on the island’s scene and here they seemed to take that to a new, more solid level.

Coastal Fire Dept.
Coastal Fire Dept.

Playing their own version of what got called ‘grunge’ in the early 90s their dark and heavy (often both musically and thematically) songs were unleashed with a greater sense of power and confidence than ever.

Added to the mix for a few numbers was a second guitar, played by Mikey Ferbrache who’s been working with the band in the studio on their upcoming debut EP. This added another element to the wall of fuzzed up noise that they call ‘grunge from the Vale’ and (rather predictably) made for my highlight set of the night with their own tracks topped off by covers of Nirvana’s School and Vaselines’ Molly’s Lips.

Following the raw power of Coastal Fire Dept came the measured precision of Kings to round off the fourth of four very different sounding acts.

Kings
Kings

With a series of singles over the last year or so Kings have built their name on their recordings and videos but their live shows, while comparatively rare, have also helped the band gain a following who were present tonight, though they did take a little coaxing from frontman Eli Crossan to get onto the dancefloor.

While it’s no secret I prefer things a bit rougher around the edges there’s no denying that Kings captured the energy of the audience tonight and got an atmosphere going with bodies bouncing around the dancefloor and singing the expertly designed call and response sections back to them.

The highlights of Kings’ set came with their final two, newer, tracks that saw the band rely less on the production effects and be more free to express themselves, closing things on a high point that had many calling for more.

Kings
Kings

With another, similarly varied, double-header lined up for May, including a one-off comeback show from Third Time Lucky (a pop rocking highlight on the scene over a decade ago), Havoc Events continue to stick to their broad musical manifesto, and so far their shows certainly feel like something of an alternative to other gigs going on around the island.


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