The Wondertuff at The 1865, Southampton 26.7.2023 with Ian Prowse supporting
Arrived late for this one due to a bad back – the creaking grey-haired gig goer eh – and preparation for camping trip (!) next day, but got in to catch the last few Ian Prowse songs. I’ve seen him before supporting Elvis Costello in Bath and glad I got to hear the excellent Does This Train Stop on Merseyside again. (Link is to my Elvis blog).
I’ve always enjoyed Wonder Stuff gigs – mine go back a long way to that first album tour (1988) but there was a big gap. (Previous Wonder Stuff gig blog has more details.) Not all my fault as they split up after the release of the fourth LP which they are showcasing tonight – it’s 30 years since release of Construction for the Modern Idiot. It’s the first one I didn’t buy (cassettes at that stage). To save my back I sit down upstairs wondering if I should be here.
The upstairs balcony at The 1865, up and round beyond the raised rear bar, has some upholstered benches around the walls but unless you get a standing spot at the rail you can’t see anything. You can hear it fine so as the penny dropped that they were playing whole of an album that I didn’t know, at all, I saved myself for the second set.
It’s not that I mind hearing all new stuff: I’ve seen main man Miles Hunt solo and bought the 2017 album (We Came Here to Work) with violin playing Erica Nockalls, after listening to some of his sanity saving Lockdown livestreams. It is largely that my back was killing me that kept me seated (my wife Sally was no better.)
The violin was lifting the better songs in the first set tonight – what a great musician she is.
I had started watching where we’d got to on the LP and at the end I thought Miles was joking when he said they were going to do a couple of b-sides to round off this first section. He wasn’t.
At the break we made our way downstairs. It was rammed but recent sell outs have seen us find room down near the left hand wall. No good if you want to be making visits to the bar and bogs but fine otherwise once you get there.
The second set was what I needed. Heavy on The Eight Legged Groove Machine album. For me A Wish Away was the winner. Jumping up and down 80s music with guitars getting a full on go. Give, Give, Give, More, More, More has a similar appeal – that one ends the second set.
There are other nuggets in there – Golden Green – more prominent violin – No for the 13th Time and Caught in My Shadow. Size of a Cow is introduced as a ‘the most ridiculous song we ever wrote’ but it is catchy and probably isn’t.
This second set restores my faith although I pledge to go and listen to that fourth LP again, now I have that much maligned Spotify luxury.
They come back for two more: Unbearable and later ‘Eight Legged’ extra track Ten Trenches Deep. Well and truly a gig of two halves. I am sure I will be back again for more, more, more, as long as Miles Hunt (now a youthful looking 57) is up for it.
Gigs with Ivan 