After closing their doors to move down the road, Zula celebrated their grand re-opening with an impressive line-up of bands over last Friday and Saturday. I’m not an aKing fan so gave the Saturday a miss, but checked out the Friday, along with what felt like 1000s of other people…

 

First off, the new place is huge (and was already buzzing when I got there around 8) with 2 stages and 3 (by my count) bar areas separated by a narrow staircase (which I cursed often throughout the night).  I think I prefer the smaller space downstairs,  it just felt a bit more honest somehow. Plus the lighting was better and so was the sound. Unfortunately, the ska-ish stuff was downstairs, so I spent most of the night with the rock stuff upstairs.

 

Things got off to a lateish start (although relatively early in the scheme of things); upstairs, the night kicked off with some drummers and a brief welcome speech.

Saintfearless had the dubious honour of being the first band to play the new stage, meaning that the crowd wasn’t too sizeable and they were drowned in a beige soup as the smoke machine operator tried to get a feel for how much smoke to use (his findings seemed to indicate that smoke was a bad idea and the machine was pretty much untouched for the rest of the night)…but the band seemed unfazed, soldiering on through the fog and coaxing people out of the cavernous hall’s corners to dance by the stage. Fun to watch as ever.

I headed downstairs at the end of their set in time to catch the last few tracks from The Liminals, who I’d never heard of before. I didn’t hear much but what I did, I liked and thought they were pretty cool.

In the gap after they finished, Jess & I braved the flooded stairway to head back upstairs for Red Tape Riot. I’d just heard one of their songs previously (the catchy Decay on their Facebook page) and thought it was pretty cool, so was curious to hear some of their other material.

The first song wasn’t wildly impressive, and the sound was starting to go south. The awkwardness of the big stage also started becoming apparent (and would develop as the night wore on); the 2 pillars framing the centre seemed to chop off and isolate some of the band members (typically the bassists), as did the lack of light in the right hand corner; it was unfortunate…

Jess was itching to head back to the ska downstairs, so we agreed to give Red Tape Riot 3 songs to win us over – seeing as the opener was a bit weak, the track I knew/liked was number two and the third was brand new and a bit unpolished, things weren’t looking great, and we were battling the stairs again shortly after.

I didn’t dislike them but I really wasn’t feeling them, maybe another time.

Back downstairs, The Little Kings had gained a member since the last time I saw them. I’m not the biggest fan of all things Reggae and ska but I do like The Little Kings. Last time I saw them was a very chilled evening at the Grand Daddy Hotel, a setting that matched them perfectly I thought, so it was cool to see them fit perfectly in a livelier setting too.

Wolftown were supposed to be playing next upstairs; as we weren’t reeeally in the biggest rush to see them we stopped by the bar for a while…

Then battled the stairs for the last time for a while, to find that Wolftown were definitely not playing and that The Jack Mantis Band were instead. I guess they must’ve swapped, as TJMB were billed for Saturday, but I’m not sure…either way I hadn’t seen them before and was only able to identify them because of the name on their setlist…

I don’t remember their music much (but remember thinking it was pretty cool at the time…) which is probably because I was more distracted by how they looked, and the fact that they looked like they didn’t belong together made it feel like they belonged together.

The keyboardist kinda resembled a Victorian pirate gypsy (with red shoes); Mr Mantis himself had the home-knitted-hat-and-guitar-strap hippie thing going,  along with some really cool tattoos; the bassist (lost in the darkness behind the pillar) was pretty much an average guy but a deadringer for a friend of mine and I couldn’t really see the drummer, but I think he might’ve had a hat…

Had he not have been lingering at the side of the stage for about 10 minutes prior to walking up to the mic, the presence of the weird ringmaster guy in stilts might’ve been pretty surprising, at any rate his (bad) Southern accent was unexpected…and I really don’t know what the point of having him there was (if he introduced the earlier bands I missed that).

I dunno what it is about Ashtray Electric I don’t like, they seem to have all the right elements I’m just not moved by them…it’s odd, it’s not even like I can say ‘they’re alright’ or ‘I don’t mind them’ because I just don’t really have an opinion of them…I suppose I want to like them, because I feel like I should, but I just don’t…

With this in mind, it seemed like a good opportunity to shoot with the Lensbaby a bit…

Ringmaster guy was back again (this time, inexplicably, his accent oscilated between French and Mexican) to introduce the upstairs headliners, the Springbok Nude Girls. I felt a bit embarassed at never having seen them before, especially once they started playing –  they really perform like the vetrans they are.

I really enjoyed them I’m just sorry I couldn’t hear better – things had deteriorated pretty badly by this point and I heard a lot of guitar and not too much else which is a real shame…plus the shadow corner claimed both the dark-haired black-clad bassist and the trumpet/keyboard player.

Nevertheless, I really enjoyed the band and am glad I finally got around to seeing them.

Overall I’m not really sure how I feel about the new venue…I enjoyed the night for the most part though and am definitely curious to see how they handle more normal gigs in the future…

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If, like me, you’ve somehow missed out on them before, check out The Springbok Nude Girls on Facebook and Myspace

Ashtray Electric  |  The Jack Mantis Band   |  The Little Kings

Red Tape Riot  |  The Liminals  |   Saintfearless

The guys who wanted me to take your picture, you’re over here…

Photos on Facebook here