The human dynamo saving rock and roll
Wembley Arena Catfish and the Bottlemen
‘Wembley!” roared Van McCann, half battle cry, half awe-struck gasp of selfamazement. And Wembley roared right back at the lithe, excitable young frontman of Catfish and the Bottlemen.
Playing the cavernous space of Wembley Arena has long been considered one of the golden rungs on the upward climb. It is an impossible pinnacle for some, a foothill for others, and the young British guitar-slinging quartet were determined to make the most of their debut.
This was a rip-roaring gig, loud and brash, swaggering and sexy, charged with thunderous drumming and tautly meshed guitars and lifted by mass, lusty crowd singing. “Wembley, bring it up!” demanded McCann, and 12,500 fans complied, raising their voices louder as the band stopped playing and just watched in amazement.
At least half of this audience were girls in their late teens and twenties – a rare sight at a big rock show – arms aloft, singing every line of every song as if it was scripture. The other half were boys, some with arms wrapped around girlfriends, singing along, some moshing in amiable aggression, some tearing off shirts to climb up on each other’s shoulders.
It seems a very long time since a rock band has managed to stir this kind of excitement. In commercial terms, guitar music has been in apparently terminal decline for most of this century, as tastes and charts have shifted to a digital soundscape of electro-R’n’B.
There were no keyboards at the Catfish concert, and none of the ubiquitous backing tracks that increasingly rob live music of any spontaneity. These four skinny, long-haired young men were making this noise all on their own, stretching songs out, slowing things down, dropping out to make space for the crowd, slamming back together with a thrilling jolt. It was a powerful reminder of how simple and effective this time-honoured format can be.
Catfish are not reinventing the wheel. They make tightly honed, dense, melodic two-guitar rock that draws elements from new wave, indie, garage, grunge and Britpop, plumbing a line through Nirvana, Oasis and The Strokes.
McCann writes about relationships rather than issues or ideas, with a gift for knocking out heartfelt belters about the tribulations of love, lust and commitment. He has remarked that his musical contemporaries “started thinking too outside the box, trying to be arty and different. We wanted to stay inside the box.”
He’s a dynamo on stage. Moving with irrepressible energy, grabbing the microphone as his guitar swings around his waist, he sings with a passionate commitment, his vocals and musicianship constantly shifting his band into another gear.
He’s a natural-born star whose sincerely romantic instincts seem to have given him some purchase in the modern-pop marketplace. Can romance save rock and roll?
Their tightly honed melodic two-guitar rock draws from new wave, indie, garage, grunge and Britpop