ICA - Sat 2Sep00

Mute Irregular Club Night #8
ICA, 2 September 2000 (22.00-22.15)

• Stupid Kunst
• System Blues
• 'Til The Stars In His Eyes Are Dead
• Going Off

It began with a wall of terrifically loud, physical and disjointed techno which corrupted into guttural guitar when they revealed themselves. No one had even figured out that the set had begun, so when Howard Devoto and Pete Shelley emerged the audience were taken completely off guard. Great planning.

This was a special night, not least for the re-emergence of a partnership lost to time. Last seen together in the Tony Wilson fronted 'B'dum B'dum' documentary (Granada 1978), the idea of Devoto and Shelley collaborating was and still is too exciting to contemplate. The seasoned Buzzcocks fans who were present tonight behaved like it was Christmas, fidgeting in nearby pubs and checking their watches relentlessly. For one night only Devoto was Santa and Shelley a deranged pop pixie, discharging shards of guitar noise into a stunned crowd. Even the sound guy was shaking with vocal anticipation.

There had after all been no time for the news to sink in. Announced on buzzcocks.com and this humble Magazine web site only three days before, the revelation spread like wildfire. It did not help that it was such a small venue, with an approximate capacity of 150. Lucky bastards one and all.

So what did we witness to reward those burning, ticket-hunting temples days before? Four songs in fifteen minutes - slightly longer than 'Spiral Scratch' but just as pertinent. The chants for 'Boredom' and Devoto's reinvention of Vliet's 'I Love You, You Big Dummy' met with dead ears. This was not a time for the past, but a fresh start - the express intent of a very special reunion. The credit of 'Lyrics-Devoto/Music-Shelley' may or may not appear on a future Mute release, but we can rest easy that it is now a distinct possibility.

First track 'Stupid Kunst' extends the pun of the name. Shelley informed me that it came about over dinner, attributing to Howard the brain wave of "we've had cocks, so let's have kunst!". It is demonstrably an opposite to their origins and a German word which translates as 'art'. On stage Devoto pointed to Pete, cheekily proclaiming "this is Buzz and-". From one word is born irony and double meaning. Howard still loves language.

He has also adopted profanity. The show stopper, 'Til The Stars In His Eyes Are Dead', is positively loaded with words about a character who, Howard spits, is "having a world wide wank". Alliteration, venom and hilarity all at the same point. It is assuring that he can still provoke multiple responses in a single bound. It is also his best song since 'Redneck'.

Shelley undercuts (or is that over cuts?) this ostentatious display with siren effects, a br()et of samples and an insistent, pounding guitar which evokes the cyclical excitement of Krautrock (Michael Karoli, Neu!) yet sounds totally other. Pete should really do this more often.

The words are draped over the music in a manner not unlike the two Luxuria collections - sparing, powerful, beguiling and as he reveals in 'Stupid Kunst', "all my own work". The wall of noise buries the words, rendering them incoherent. Howard suggested that this was partly the intention. Distant and elliptical, Devoto has not changed - he has simply become better at his craft. The final song, 'Going Off', was again replete with a lucid and emotionally charged vocal. A return to an old theme too - against nature, the suggestion of an unstable artifice: "We're going off/We're not really nature". And then they too are off.

Howard behaved like someone half his age - gyrating and belting his texts into the microphone like a man possessed. Precisely the opposite of what one would expect from a man who left the live circuit over a decade ago, rejected music almost completely and began a steady job in a photo library. This felt as epoch making as their appearance at Screen On The Green in 1977, said one Buzzcocks follower. It was that exciting.

So, remarkable and assuring all at the same time. However this project could just be fleeting. Howard told me four months ago that he had no great desire to return to music. This time around he genuinely "came from nowhere", but will he go "straight back there"? Let's hope not.

Ian
05/09/00

pictures half-inched from buzzcocks.com.