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Live Review and Interview: The Alistair Sheerin Band @ The Forum Scout Night
1. Opia 2. I Bet You're Sorry Now 3. Run For Their Money 4. Simple Little Tricks 5. Start Again 6. Hope To Reality 7. A Question Of You 8. Just The Way That It Goes 9. Cold Turkey 10. Take It All
Taking to the stage, immaculately adorned in full Mod attire (including a Paul Weller 'Modfather' haircut), 'Boro born jack-the-lad Alistair Sheerin could quite easily have just stepped off of Carnaby Street in 1960's London.
Despite his vintage looks, Alistair and his band offered a modern and fresh sound with their unique, hooky blend of genres spanning from Britpop and Merseybeat to indie and Motown influences, still managing to sound refreshing and up-to-date.
The band's performance was faultless. Alistair radiated confidence, strutting and dancing about the stage with boundless energy and swagger, with impressive guitar chops (particularly on tracks such as Take It All and I Bet You're Sorry Now) and a surprisingly wide vocal range.
The rest of the band also held firm for the full set, with a solid and unwavering rhythm section and rhythm guitar creating a wall of sound that more than supported Alistair's vocals. You'd struggle to believe that this was their first live performance together.
The set was dynamic, with a diverse array of tracks; from the singalong chorus of Run For Your Money to the distinctly 'Motown' feel of A Question Of You, right through to the mellow, laid back acoustic vibes of Start Again, there was plenty to keep the audience on its toes.
I caught up with Alistair earlier in the day.
If you could describe your music in three words, what would they be? Oh, erm... I'd say catchy, rocking and honest!
Who are your musical influences?
I love Miles Kane. I love Oasis, Noel Gallagher's the reason I picked up a guitar. I love all the '60s stuff, like Bob Dylan, Lennon, The Beatles, The Small Faces and the Kinks. I like all sorts, but I love some of the obscure stuff like folk music and psychedelic stuff, a lot of soul, motown and all that stuff. I like everything. I go into it liking it and let it turn me off. I find that's a good way to go.
What's your songwriting process like? Usually with about two chords on the guitar, which I play for about two weeks, over and over. Then I'll pick up a line that I'll sing for about two weeks, and a different part of the song that I play for two weeks. I just play it over and over until it's finished. It's very rare that I write a whole song in one sitting.
How do you find inspiration for lyrics? I just write about everyday things, just things that I see. I like to watch people, so I write about my experience of watching people, but there's another approach as well which I used on the opening song tonight. The words are just complete and utter gibberish. I took inspiration from those Love Heart sweets and advertisements in the post and stuff like that. You don't have to be narrow minded, you can look everywhere for inspiration.
What do you make of Darlington's music scene? To be honest, I don't really know what it's like. I'm from Middlesbrough really, but I've played this venue before, this will be about the fifth time. From the scene I've seen in this venue, it could do with a few more original acts but I'm sure they're about somewhere. It's probably because it's a big venue to fill for an original band.
How big a role do you think the internet plays nowadays in marketing music, and getting it out to people? Probably too big of an input. A lot of people don't want to go out and put posters up anymore, a lot of people don't want to buy CD's anymore. They just want to download it at the click of a button. People have lost their grounding with it, they can easily watch a gig on YouTube and they won't go to a gig. They've got live streaming of gigs now which is wrong. If you don't go out and see live music, you don't get the true experience. In terms of advertising, Facebook is good but it's basically taken over everything. There's no point in a band having websites anymore and that's a downside. So I suppose it's good in some ways, bad in some ways.
You can check Alistair out on Facebook here!
By Thomas Johnston