This Ain’t The Summer Of Love
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Most people know about the Nomads. Most punkrock and garage bands list them as influences.
So, I guess that an explanation isn’t really needed, but I´ll do a short one:
Nomads has been around for more than 20 years, they infact just had their big 20th Anniversary where they had every bandmember and additional musicians, joined them on stage and where also Sator and Flaming Sideburns were playing. Quite a party I was told and I guess that is what you expect from this band. More than 20 7″ and a dozen full-lenghts released, well now, that´s almost a complete recordcollection. They just released a new album “Up Tight” on White Jazz and are currently on tour in Germany to support it. But, a week ago, they played in Malmö and their support was the Turpentines.
Nomads have never been my cup of tea. I have two 12″ from the mid 80´s and I am satisfied with that. They´re a little bit too experimental for my liking. I like pure punkrock´n´roll, so I went to KB just to see Turpentines. Nomads were a bonus but nothing I´d pay extra for…Apparently, KB was having a party for the regular customers and when I entered the door, I first mistook the place for a highschool disco. People were wasted as they had been serving free and cheap, cheap booze at KB. Then I saw Björn and Kalle and figured out that it had something to do with free booze and not with underage girls…even though you´ll never know…I had just bought my first beer when Turpentines went on stage. KB usually have nightclubs starting at midnight and they just wanted the rock´n´roll to be over, so that they could put on Destiny´s Child and Sonique for the nightclub people. Always the rush, the rush..
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I must confess, this wasn´t Turpentines best show ever. Usually, they´re a little more focused live, with a tight grip ´round the crowd.Maybe it was the drunk Eddie Vedder look-a-like in a velvet jacket and flounces who got them hypnotized as he kept pouring beer all over himself as he was the runner up in a wet t-shirt contest. I have to admit, I had my focus on him, it was true entertainment….Turpentines play straightforward punkrock´n´roll with a lot of hooks and even more clichees, and released their second album last summer, “By Popular Demand” on White Jazz. But, this band is on it´s bad days, still 10 times better live than 50% of the bands I´ve mentioned on Coolgrrrls throughout the years.It´s not that they´re a wild, rowdy bunch like 69hard, but the songs are so good and they´re a tight band. Hell, it wouldn´t even matter if they all had pink tutus on, they would still be more punkrock than most.
For more info on Turpentines, go to http://home.swipnet.se/~w-62959/
So, the Nomads…. What did I do?! Did I just sit in the bar, inventing new drinks while sporting my new outfit, waiting for people to buy me drinks?! Not really, it´s not really my thing…I was front row with my camera of course. It seems that Nomads had more fans they´re than Turpentines, way more fans. But I guess, with 20 years in the buisness, you´d expect more than just some drunk regular customers up front..There were a lot of jumping, screaming and singalong. Worse than a Spice Girls show but with people way over 20. I was quite amazed. I knew they were good live, but not that good. I admire people who can act normal in front of a big crowd. Chat with them like they were old time friends. No rockstar-attitude, no posing. Just being yourself and playing your music. Being able to change the setlist during a show cause some fans were screaming for a certain song…and coming back on stage not only once but twice cause the fans were screaming.
That´s cool and that´s what it all should be about.
The Nomads website is located at http://w1.855.telia.com/~u85508172/
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