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BELLMER DOLLS
PlayLouder @ The Old Blue Last, London UK
Wednesday, December 6th 2006
Three years ago I interviewed a man called James Sclavunos. If that name rings a bell, it might be because Sclavunos is the Bad Seeds' drummer, The Horrors' producer and a member of the emergent Grinderman. The subject of our conversation, though, was Sclavunos' own band The Vanity Set, creators of avant-garde music that's equal parts jazzy, progressive, gothic, literary and burlesque. At one point Sclavunos told me about his guitarist Peter Mavrogeorgis. "I quite disliked him when I first met him," recalled the six-foot-eight-inch aristocrat of his six-string accomplice, "but I've come to quite adore him. There's a couple of Greeks in the band; there's some sort of weird magnetism there."
Based in New York City, Bellmer Dolls aim to infuse ugly trash-blues with an air of Weimar decadence. Mavrogeorgis is their singer and guitarist, so it's no surprise to see Sclavunos in the audience. It's even less of a surprise to see Gallon Drunk singer (and erstwhile Bad Seed) James Johnston here, for his is perhaps the band that Bellmer Dolls most resemble.
The week before this gig, I saw the Dolls play a slightly sloppy, indulgent show at Hoxton Bar & Grill. Tonight, it's a different story: they're fierce and focused. Driving the band forward is bassist Anthony Malat who, rather perfectly, runs a New York menswear boutique called Sinner/Saint. Malat looks like he should be in a cowpunk band and, equally, like he could kill with his bare hands, and he plays his bass like he's wrestling an enraged serpent. Yet in sonic terms he's the band's sensible one. His pounding, hypnotic bass-lines provide a solid structure from which Mavrogeorgis (and drummer Daniel Sheerin) can depart on flights of fancy.
Always a restless, twitchy presence, Mavrogeorgis occasionally goes through something like an onstage exorcism. It happens tonight during the penultimate 'Push! Push!' (the fire-and-brimstone sermon that opens debut EP 'The Big Cats Will Throw Themselves Over'). As the song slow-burningly builds toward climax, Mavrogeorgis flips out. Diving from the stage, he starts screaming the song's titular invocation while swinging his guitar wildly about by the strap. It whizzes within inches of the front row's noses, but nDONOTBLOCKOURADSobody moves a muscle. We're transfixed.
Mavrogeorgis here exhibits the same deranged preacher-man intensity in which James Johnston once specialised. Also like Gallon Drunk, Bellmer Dolls are maybe best described as blooze-hounds: their take on old-school rhythm & blues sounds like it's full of strong liquor and tweaked beyond reason. Behind the drumkit, Sheerin is a cyclone of intensity. Out front, Mavrogeorgis frenziedly coaxes noise and feedback (plus the odd shimmering melody line) from his Rickenbacker, while delivering reference-loaded lyrics in a breathless, strangulated croon.
After 'Push! Push!' has provided the set's crescendo, Bellmer Dolls find themselves in the classic Trail of Dead quandary: the stage has pretty much been trashed, but there's still one song to play. They persevere, though: wires are untangled, equipment plugged back in and straps reaffixed to guitars, and during the subsequent set-closer the impression is of a vicious storm dying down and calmness descending. When the Dolls finally take their leave to approving roars, a passing fan records pity for whoever has to follow them.
This, then, is Bellmer Dolls. I disliked them when I first met them, but I've come to quite adore them. There's some sort of weird magnetism there.
Niall O'Keeffe (playlouder.com)
DARK AND DAMAGED --- JUST HOW I LIKE MY ROCK AND ROLL" - JIM JARMUSCH.
MOST BEAUTIFUL. --- PAPER MAGAZINE
