The Bohemian in Richmond, Johannesburg, is one of my favourite live-music venues. Its not the sound system, which I have literally witnessed almost frying a young enthusiastic bass player, or the great lighting — sorry, I meant candles … the ones that dripped wax all down the back of my good shirt the other night.
It’s not even the stylish mural that drowns out the band when you’re trying to photograph them. No, it’s none of these things. The reason I like the Bohemian is because it really is the kind of place where you can end up in a conversation with anyone. You could share a drink with a plumber, a nurse, a biker, a Scottish ex-pat, a development lecturer, a television producer or various musos and hacks.
Add to this cheap drinks, decent pizza, pool tables and the best jukebox in town. See what I mean? But the Bohemian’s real drawcard is the live music; you can catch a veteran South African rocker on one night and a young, snotty punk band the next.
Last weekend I put in a mammoth stint at the Boh, as us regulars like to call it, catching country-rockers Jim Neversink, punk-rock debutants The He-Shes, indie-rock newcomers The Black Hotels, indie-pop darlings The Bang and veteran reggae outfit Tidal Waves over three nights. I sat down with The Bang and Tidal Waves to have a chat.
The Bang are a young Johannesburg band who have been around for a while now, having recorded their debut album, Shiny, back in 2004. However, with multi-instrumentalist Gad de Combes rejoining the band last year after a stint at film school, the band have started gigging a lot more regularly, taking their unique indie-pop sound to the masses.
Lead singer and songwriter Joshua Gregg sees The Bang as part of the “burgeoning indie-rock scene” that has sprung up from nowhere in the past year. “People are maybe sick of black-clad bands that play ‘I hate my mummy and daddy’ music,” says Gregg. “My problem with a lot of young bands is that they don’t know how to convey their angst in a creative way.
“I try to leave my songs open-ended and not spell things out. All my favourite albums are the ones that you put on five times and don’t seem to get it — and then, bang!”
Now, one of the things I like most about The Bang are their complete lack of pretentious “I’m a rock star” posturing. There’s no “Oh, we don’t talk about our influences!” crap to deal with; in fact, they want to talk about who has influenced them because they are confident enough in their music and abilities to know that no matter how many R.E.M. albums they own, they only sound like The Bang.
They may listen to The Eels, Arcade Fire, Grant Lee Buffalo and U2, but their music is unlike that of any of those bands. When I tell them that I could hear hints of Elvis Costello’s early songs in their music, they admit to being very unfamiliar with his records.
Now, let’s get on to this sound of The Bang that I am going on about, because there are two versions of the band. There is The Bang on Shiny, which is an intimate, sparkling, jangly indie-pop record drowned in a childlike naivety, and then there is The Bang live, which is a way more raucous rock affair where they take those pop gems and show them off in their unpolished glory.
Unpolished is a relative term here, I hasten to add, because The Bang are an incredibly polished band to begin with — sometimes too polished. But you have to love their ambition and the fact that they would wrap a song about serial killer John Wayne Gacy Jnr in swathes of jangly pop guitar and keyboard freakouts, so that the end result is something nearer to a cheery summer holiday song.
I was really glad to hear that Tidal Waves were playing alongside The Bang at the Boh, because ever since I received a copy of their third album, Musik and de Method, I have wanted to catch a show. The problem with Tidal Waves is that they are so bloody popular; they spend a serious amount of time outside South Africa touring Europe and far-off places like New Zealand.
Formed in 1997, Tidal Waves are a testament to how a hard-working and -touring band can survive in South Africa, no matter how tough it gets. Signed by Sony/BMG in 1998, they released their first album, aptly titled Hard Work, in 2000. Although fans responded well to the band live, the record company did not push the album.
“That album was a very good album. It was a shame that we were working with people who did not believe in our music,” says drummer Sam “Drumbo” Shoai. “The reps would go to the stores and open the catalogue and would just brush over us.
“People are still interested in the music. At the gigs they ask where can we get your first album, but they can’t because we don’t have copies.”
Shoai says they are in negotiations with Sony/BMG to get the masters for the album back because someone in Europe wants to release a compilation of tracks from all three of their albums for their growing fan base in Belgium, Italy and The Netherlands.
So how did Tidal Waves become such a success in Europe? The answer is simple: hard work. As regular Oppikoppi favourites, they were in contact with many Dutch and Belgium acts that came to play the festival as part of the Oppikoppi/Pukkelpop cultural exchange. One of the bands loved Tidal Waves so much, they took their albums back to The Netherlands and passed them on to festival promoters.
When said promoters visited South Africa on a scouting mission, catching a Tidal Waves show was on their priority list. Lead singer Jacob “Boogie Zakes” Wulana picks up the story. “We were playing Tings ‘n Times and we were killing it left and right,” he chuckles. “They were calling The Netherlands while we were playing, saying, ‘Listen to this band.’ When we got off stage, they said, ‘We are taking you to The Netherlands,” and we were like, ‘Yes, please, guys.'”
From these small beginnings Tidal Waves have established themselves a following in Europe and are now committed to tours for the next three years. They are also contracted to play Belgium’s Mano Mundo festival every year until 2010.
“Out of every gig there will be two or three people who like us and follow us, so it grows,” says Shoai. “It was like that in Europe. When we played there last year, there were people that saw us the year before and they came back and brought their friends.”
If Tidal Waves’ success in Europe means we get to watch them less often, no one can begrudge them that. However, they are still gigging around South Africa for more than half the year and they promise that a new album is coming soon. Long live the Waves.