Gig review: The Black Lips

THE BLACK LIPS STEREO, GLASGOW ****

THIS Atlanta four-piece have a reputation for onstage anarchy - necessitating a sharp exit from India a couple of years ago - but they and the crowd were on comparatively decorous behaviour at this gig: just a bit of light gobbing, good-natured moshing, an isolated stagedive and a whole lot of unfettered dancing to their infectious rhythms.

Scratch the scrappy surface and their opening number was pure beat pop - drummer Joe Bradley even bobbles his head Beatles-style, while Jared Swilley favours the violin bass like McCartney. Their rambunctious arrangements and execution gave them a punk veneer but it was the ebullient tunes which elevated this show to a celebratory level.

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In 12 years of roistering, The Black Lips have dived headlong at any number of mongrel genres. This varied set featured what you might call country garage and punk doo-wop numbers beside straight-up psych rock - The Black Lips would likely be game for anything which allowed them to be simultaneously melodic and rowdy.

This may not make them wildly original but it does place them in the same noble tradition as The Ramones covering the girl groups, a heroic ballpark they invaded brilliantly on Dirty Hands with its baffled hookline "do you really wanna hold my dirty hands?" Again with The Beatles influences.

All four members contributed to their loveably boisterous vocal chorus. The distribution of singing duties may well be a precision planned operation, though it appeared that whoever had made it up to the microphone as the song kicked off would holler along haphazardly to that particular track.

There was still energy to spare by the time they revved up to the chaotic finale - no encores please, we're punk - with the smoke machine in overdrive, the slamdancing ever more frenzied and the band at their most urgent and unruly.

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