Musics: Japandroinds/A Place To Bury Strangers

Good gig last night. It was Japandroids and A Place To Bury Strangers at the Barfly. My first visit to Barfly since the refurb. The stage is better now, but the floor is still sticky and there was a whiff of vomit about the place. More things change the more they stay the same. Japandroids were the most Canadian band I’ve ever seen. They looked polite and well-fed on nutritious food, and just seemed like nice friendly guys. At one point I caught myself thinking “I’d bet they’d help you move house and you wouldn’t even need to ask”. Musically ace as well, the guitarist was a bit ROCK but his Canadian-ness made it alright. He had a fan to keep him cool, and it blew his hair around in an 80s power-ballad style. He kept saying how excited he was to be in Cardiff because his favourite band were from Cardiff, and they closed on a cover of Mclusky’s To Hell With Good Intentions. He was wearing a Future Of The Left Tshirt as well. A Place To Bury Strangers also have a Cardiff/S.Wales connections as their drummer is from Barry. I find that quite amusing. How does someone from Barry end up in a doomy cool Brooklyn band? They did their whole 80s/shoegaze/Factory records thing, machine gun drumming and sonic Ouija board assault. It killed my hearing. Forgot my earplugs. Good though. Beforehand I’d overheard some guy describing them as ‘ambient’ to one of his friends. I’d love to know what they thought after.