2nd live review from The Last Resort

Cable/ Jetpak Kingston The Robert Peel 22nd

Aaah cable how should we worship thee? Well buying their records is a start I guess, and pilgrimages to the suburbs are obviously recommended. So it was that I entered the steamy confines of this rather sleazy venue (its a topless bar by day apparently) to be confronted by some sort of wannabe punks playing to their mates. I was disturbed to hear that this was Jetpak. On this showing these boys are an old fashioned Crunchie to Cables New Poppin' candy version, simply no contest. Still the place was rammed to the gills with bouncing young 'uns, so despite my advancing years, I could feel the hungry call of hard-core racing through me. Sadly most of the rest of the crowd didn't and by the time Cable got on, to the excitement of me, Piers Cash Cow and about four other people in the room, the crowd was kind of drifting. Admittedly there were sound problems, guitar cut outs, etc but Jesus this is Cable, the finest live band in the kingdom. Sadly no one cared and there was a fairly lacklustre response to the fantastic likes of "Seventy" and "God Gave me gravity". Cable's frustration was evident even as they punched each tune out, with Matt even asking the crowd, "Does anyone know who we are?". However, even with this lackadaisical bunch there was some fearsome pogoing to the closing "Honolulu" (next single we pray) and old fave "Oubliette", but somewhere something is going wrong. Their new album is recorded, but it ain't out, it's now been put back six months (so far). Singles come falling out of this group like you wouldn't believe, but people seem to be more interested in stuff that's just that little bit safer, that little bit more ordinary. As we filed out the DJ played "Sad but True" and it felt desperately appropriate.