d'espairsray live

For those that have never enjoyed the bizarre little venue that is the Rainbow Bar in Birmingham, imagine a small courtyard at the back of a pub. Then put a kind of see through plastic corrugated roof on, with a few drapes…none of which is quite fitted together properly, so the rain comes through. That’s your venue. It’s daylight as Heaven’s Basement take to the stage, with the select audience dodging the drips, surrounded by plants and graffiti art and it’s a really strange feel of half venue cum, back yard / half festival feel. “This is the weirdest f***ing venue we’ve ever played!” announces singer Richie Hevanz, and nobody there disagrees with him.

Despite the small crowd and freaky venue, Heaven’s Basement cracked on with what they do best; catchy classic rock. A strong opening as usual with the marvellous catchy trio of songs Tear Your Heart Out, Can't Let Go and Misunderstood starting off a forty-minute set which won over a few more new fans… as they always do. Not the most electrifying I’ve seen them due to the strange place and crowd and random half daylight on stage, but another flawless performance with stunningly tight playing as ever.

To say there weren’t many there was an understatement. But at £17 for a pub gig in the middle of a recession, it’s hardly surprising. It had been moved from Eddies and the rather strange and elite audience were mainly a bunch of about a hundred hardcore J-Rock fans to see Japanese rockers D’espairsRay being their Psychedelic Parade in Europe tour to the UK. A bizarre mix of ages, sexes, and styles. The adoring fan girls in fluorescent JRock fashions on the front row, the metallers in the middle headbanging away, a couple of Japanese people who had come along to see their fellow countrymen. I have never been to a stranger show venue wise or audience wise.

Opening with the catchy and immediate Lizard and Redeemer from the latest album, the band had half of the crowd immediately singing along despite the fact it was all in Japanese. In spite of the strange surrounding the sound was also surprisingly good.

The Japanese can be very culturally different when it comes to certain things, and one of the most noticeable at gigs is their absolute zero tolerance policy of photo taking. D’espa were no different and the minute they were on and people got out cameras and mobile phones they were pounced on violently by the big crew making them stop.

And nice photos they would have taken too in the daylight. The band were well decked out, bass player Zero shining in silver sparkly vest and sparkly neck scarf, topped off with smart waistcoat. The girls at the front obviously went a little bit weak at the knees as the D’espa guys are all very pleasing on the eye if you like your Japanese boys. Guitarist Karyu was soon teasing them mercilessly by leaning backwards into the front rows on top of them.

Another difference was that the Japanese, unlike most British ‘rock’ acts, are not afraid to use backing tracks to aid their sound on stage. Much more common with European bands, it’s frowned upon in the live rock circuit in the UK as almost cheating. But lots of synth type intros to songs from the on stage laptop helped give a more layered, polished and produced feel, which along with the fantastic hooks and tuneful backing vocals makes this JRock more accessible than some of their heavier counterparts. Vocalist Hizumi was struggling badly with illness and maybe couldn’t give his usual all, but the already converted didn’t care, and this was still a fine all round performance with old and new songs alike giving a balanced set list. Zero finished the evening spraying the delighted fans with water, downing bottle after bottle and spitting it all out all over them.

The heavy handed tactics of their bouncers really kicked into action when a fan dared to give the band a present as they came of stage, and she was violently manhandled by the bouncer. Maybe that sort of behaviour is ok in Japan, but over here, in a back room of a Birmingham pub in front of a few dozen happy punters, that sort of treatment of a young girl was bordering on assault. Not a pleasant end to a great gig and all the people that surround these JRock bands, please guys, ease up and chill out! UK fans just wanna say hi, grab a few photos and have great memories… it’s not like we get to see them very often over here. Which is a real shame, as D’espairsRay are a class act.

by Lynn Wyeth