I can’t remember when last Capetonians were as spoilt for choice of cool gigs as we were last Saturday. A little bit of disappointment was inevitable, but while I’m sorry to have missed Desmond & the Tutus and Holiday Murray at The Assembly, I really enjoyed seeing Coal again and am glad to have caught Them Tornados before they take some time off from gigging.

I really enjoyed  last month’s acoustic gig by the lovely ladies (and gentleman) of Coal and was keen to see them again, this, coupled with my curiousity on how Zula would handle a normal gig following the chaos and intensity of their re-opening party, was why I chose their gig over all the other ones that seemed to have conspired to take place on the same night.

I think it was because of all those aforementioned gigs, along with the fact that they were the opening act, that the crowd at Zula was pretty sparse (though it would take a lot of people to make their cavernous hall feel anywhere near to being full). It’s a real shame though because Coal’s music really is lovely.

Venue-wise I was glad to see the dark corner of doom on the side of the stage had been ‘cordoned off’ by piles of musical equipment and that the band area was restricted to the space between the pillars. I still found the lighting quite bad and the sound iffy, but was glad to see there were guys collecting the bottles and glasses this time round.

Like I said, Coal had been the main attraction for me (though I was curious to see Dustland Express…) so when I got the chance to go through to Club Voom Voom to see Them Tornados I was keen…especially after watching Black Moscow for a while…

I like heavy music I just wasn’t really feeling the two or so songs of theirs I heard…granted they might’ve improved had I stayed to watch but when the mic and lights died at the same time halfway through their second song, it felt like time to go…

I hadn’t been to Voom Voom before; it’s a nice space, it’s just a pity it too was so under-attended.  I thought Them Tornados were great plus their whole look and vibe’s really cool (especially that shark-smiling double bass); I’ve been wanting to check them out for ages so am really glad to have finally done so.

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Coal on Facebook (and some demos on Soundcloud here)

Them Tornados on Facebook  |  Black Moscow on Facebook

Photos on Facebook here