Do Make Say Think, Live @ London Scala

If you have a little trouble discerning who’s who in the photos below, please note that The Happiness Project was between four and six members of Do Make Say Think, Years was alternately two, one and all members; Do Make Say Think themselves fluctuated in number throughout their hour plus set. And yet, and yet (sorry) this three set takeover of the Scala had more merit than one might expect.

Despite the sonic fatigue of hearing musicians, however skilled, elaborating on their theme ‘neath various guises and overall aesthetics, the near continuous presence of their particular energy afforded a build-up of ecstasy tailor made for toying with the emotions these groups induce. Unfortunately Do Make Say Think continued to plough and play around with the backwash long after the wave broke two thirds of the way through their set.

But considering the fact that I had driven the six hours to London, been on the tube for an hour and a half, eaten a limp somosa for dinner and had to stand at the front of the venue for almost three hours to obtain these here photos I was utterly shocked by how energised I felt, perhaps even more so by the end of the night. Much of this had to do with Charles Spearin’s The Happiness Project. I stand by that 9/10 review I gave it back along, and as such I was intrigued to see how well he (they) would translate it to the live setting. 

A giggling saxophonist began proceedings with a rendition of ‘Mrs Morris’. She ably elucidated the groups M.O., highlighting the musicality in the sampled recording of an elderly woman describing what makes her happy (a subject in which she could qualify as an Oracle, upon enthusiasm alone…). She played along, trailing down the scale to finish each sentence with the low hoot that Mrs Morris frequently rests upon, the musicians intermittent broad grin decimating anyone’s expectation that this might be a dry academic exercise. They went on the nail it, reproducing and elaborating upon pretty much the entire album. They were certainly the highlight of the night, other members contributed keys, horns, bass, guitar and violin and though there was a Do Makeness to the sound, the sampled material prompted the band to eschew their more habitual structures.

Spearin himself operated the interviews (that he himself had conducted with various neighbours) via a set of pedals whilst nimbly exchanging bass for trumpet for guitar, upon which he particularly impressed during ‘Mr Gowrie’, sending both voice and polyrhythmic, single note guitar lines spiralling away in vivid delay while continuing the colourful mapping of the man’s intonation in the foreground. To explain the diversity of the interviewee’s responses, and the subtle emphasis that Spearin places upon the unique personality in each is beyond me. All I can say is that for someone who has listened to the record a good thirty times, who expected their mind to nitpick despite their best intentions, the humanity in The Happiness Project broke through with no violence.

Years is the project of DMST guitarist Ohad Benchetrit, he explained that he was considering this to be the first ever Years show, as a previous attempt had flopped. He was joined by a trumpet player for the early part of his set, where he exhibited some jagged guitar playing. The high string twangs were a little painful without a band to mop them up, his hollowbody electric was overdriven in a way that caused me to recoil, distracting me from what was a ragged but inventive picking approach. On a well amplified acoustic things could have been different, he did in fact pick up a small acoustic for one of his latter tunes and it stands in my memory as the finest piece; running furiously up and down the frets with an open chord formation, and hammering out some intriguing flourishes.

For the last two songs he was joined by the whole gang, prompting me and more than a few others to believe that we had taken the DMST sliproad without realising it. All I can remember of this is the sudden force: they hit the ground running, left the stage for five minutes, then came out running again. If memory serves they began the DMST Official Set with ‘Do’, opener on recent long-player ‘The Other Truths’ from which they later plucked ‘Say’, the weakest moment of their set.

Of all the new material I was most hoping they would play ‘Make’, but it was their older material that had the greatest impact, upon the fans at least. For me (and the majority of the audience) it all went off during the midway appearance of ‘Fredericia’, ‘Outer and Inner Secret’ and ‘Auberge le Mouton Noir’; a song I searched for on the setlist, only recognising what ‘Black’ meant as the wispy trumpet chords predicted the crashing riff. The album ‘Winter Hymn, Country Hymn, Secret Hymn’, from which these three come, is my favourite of their records and I was thankful to them for not shunning this well worn material. The brass, the violinist, and the pair of drummers lent the material enough muscle to make the leap over the high bar my imagination sets for this kind of music. 

I’m not a post-rock fan any longer, I don’t relate to the wider scene at all, and by the forty five minute mark I was honestly wishing they would pack it in. The dynamic had become so familiar in that time as to strip it of all its power and colour. True, the most enthusiastic fans were still clamouring long after the show had finished, but the band could have struck a better balance between feeding the evangelised and not wringing the rest of us dry (especially the security guard to the right of stage, a large man who looked to be almost weeping).

It’s a very fine line to tread, and I have to say these guys do it better than any I know of. They’re helped along by the absolute amiability of their stage presence and the combination of ragged enthusiasm and prog like skill: it wasn’t exactly trying to see Spearin slide a barred chord down a six string, fretless bass, or watch Justin Small cart those tattoos and his rockabilly barnet from his battered guitar to the room shaking bass-synth on the other side of the stage.

They, or perhaps just I, meandered through some mediocre sounding material that I can’t quite place, a History in Rust track here, an Enemy Airship one there. Thank god for the encore then, a song that brought me back to my energised state. The core members came out alone and wisely chose an excellent, slippery cut from their debut album which Spearin dedicated to “anyone on acid”, if only they had laid it down ten minutes earlier. 

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