Stockton-on-Tees Proved It Is The Live Music Capital Of The North East As The Gathering Sounds Festival Triumphs
All Words and Photos – John Hayhurst
Stockton-on-Tees gets more than its fair share of criticism, but I find the place so warm, friendly and full of eager music fans deliberating over who they are going to see next. I come here twice a year at least for the two main festivals. ‘Stockton Calling’ starts my festival season and then ‘The Gathering Sounds’ is towards the back end of the year – signifying a return to indoor venues.
For both of these festivals they are incredibly well run, the venues are close to each other and quality music is plentiful. It’s pretty much the same format. Open all your independent music venues from 2pm to 11pm and each hosts 6-9 artists for the price of 1 ticket for all, it’s 1st come 1st served, so when the venues are full to capacity you can’t come in. However, with the venues being so close together it is possible to see half a set of one band and then half of another, consequently I managed to catch 24 different artists over the whole day, and still had time for a break for my bi-annual ‘Hotshot Parmo’.
You can’t see them all, so there are 2 trains of thought here, plan, plan and plan, or just go with the flow and wander – I talked to many groups of friends and they all had at least 1 planner in their crew, and the rest of them went for the ride, the music, the beer and the food. A perfect Saturday afternoon and we even had some decent weather too.
Strap yourselves in, this was a long day of fantastic music. First up is teacher turned soul singer Antony Szmierek, he’s on early because he is also at the ‘Float Along’ Festival in Sheffield later that day. It wasn’t as packed as I expected in ARC and he did a false start of his first number to get the crowd going a bit more. “I know it’s really hard to get motivated when you’ve literally got out of bed an hour earlier, but lets make some noise” and he manages to get their feet tapping and heads bobbing. ‘Rafters’ his new single went down a storm with those who arrived early.
The Social Room is basically upstairs from the KU Bar next door and is a great space with a wide low stage and an overactive smoke machine, I’ll be here quite a lot as the two main bands I want to see are on this stage. TV Death and Swim School will be on later, but I’d had a recommendation for Sugar Roulette and they had a great balance of rock and funky wah wah style guitar, reminiscent of Queens of the Stone Age, a great start but I needed to catch Hannah Robinson at The Storytellers pub just down the road from ARC and I got there just as she had started. Plenty to like about this North East girl, its a fine slice of shoe-gazey dreamy rock but with an edge – check out her latest video for ‘I’m sorry I let you down’ here .
My first visit to the legendary KU Bar for local lads Weathership next, they have a new album called ‘Splendid Beast’ out on Nov 15th and are promoting that with new tracks ‘Just a Ghost’ and ‘The Swimmer’. Quality serious faced rock and songwriting but a little too bland for me unfortunately, I like a bit more action on stage and they sounded great enough, slow euphoric build ups but with TV Death about to take to the stage in 10 minutes I beat a hasty retreat upstairs to The Social Room.
I’m willing to bore anyone to death with superlatives for this band. Now reduced to a 3-piece they seem even more animated. Drawing mainly from the EP ‘The God, the One and the Devil’ released last year, Jack on guitar and vocals is the main focal point and he is everywhere on that stage. Given more room to breathe the one legged kicks get higher as the temperature builds and the sweat increases. ‘Crank Bugs’ and the closing track of ‘Village Mentality’ are my highlights. It might have been chaos at one point when the drums started collapsing, but that’s all part of the great show they always put on. I just wish they would stretch out a bit and play further than their native North East, catch them when you can is my advice.
As I’m walking passed the KU Bar I pop in for 1 song of Lost in Translation which turned out to be the latest single ‘DWYT’ (Don’t Waste Your Time) pleasant enough, reminded me of The Kooks a bit. Velvet Tuxedo were much better though and their pastiche of 1960’s surf beat garage bands went down a storm. A break from the norm and ‘TV Talkin’ has been on my Spotify playlists ever since, another one for the must see again list.
The Georgian Theatre, which sounds grander than it is, but there is a band on called Wingz Of The Monkey who I caught at Stockton Calling earlier in the year. They are a bunch of Teesside school pals, only been together a couple of years and have been banging out some quality grunge/metal check out their latest track ‘The Dog’. I arrive just as they are doing their 1-2-1-2 tests of the mic. Eager to get on their mulletted lead singer forgoes getting changed into his suit jacket and tie and instead they crack on with their rocking set, this was well worth catching. Bass player can jump high with the best of them, and you can tell that after a few more gigs under their belt, and a new EP to be released in November, this lot will be playing much bigger venues.
Caught a bit of The Outcharms back at ARC and they were doing their Doncaster/Sheffield indie rock, can’t help but feel I’ve heard it all before though, and that jangly guitar boy bands are two a penny these days, there needs to be something special a spark of originality for any of them to stand out from the crowd – so I moved on to Pavé (pronounced Pav-Ay) who have that in spades. If you think of the heavier tracks from Wolf Alice, Yonaka, or Garbage then you won’t be far off. Pavé are a four-piece from Manchester: Alanya-Jade Simms (Lead vocals), Kevin Peate (Guitar), Ben Pursehouse (Drums), and Meg Gale (Bass). A proper band that should have been on a bigger stage, The Storytellers could not hold the talent that was evident here – expect much bigger things from them in the future, Alanya-Jade Simms has star quality and the band have some thunderous riffs and hooks to back up her impressive vocals.
After that I have my 40minute break and a delicious delicacy of the North East – The Parmo, you can’t come to Teesside and not have one, it’s practically the law around here!!
If a band drives all the way from Bristol to Stockton-on-Tees for 1 gig then I will go and see them, if they are called something ridiculous like Erotic Secrets Of Pompei then they go to the top of my must see list. Is it art rock, post punk I’m not sure where to place them, but they are the surprise of the day and I’m so glad I went. Lead singer Thomas Hawtin wears face paint/black lipstick, a red suit and a beaded necklace (which he discards quickly) over his bare chest. Wearing a Joker like crazy smile he offers madman like dancing across the stage, they have driven a long way and come to perform. Don’t get me started on song titles ‘Utterly Rudderless’ and ‘Osiris at the Large Hadron Collider’ two of my favourites. Wanted to stay for longer but I also wanted to see Youth Sector again too. This is the problem, you can’t see everyone and clashes will happen, the FOMO is real.
Youth Sector have new outfits to wear, they now look like a bunch of cowboys in jeans and matching pink and yellow shirts, also a couple of new songs from the Brighton five piece art rock band ‘Primetime’ and ‘Here Comes The Fear’ are played, its more of the same but just as good. Lissy Taylor is soundchecking in KU bar as I turn up a little early, she explains that her band have “come from different parts of the country today and we are going to give it our all for you”. Love the rock guitar sound of the band, vocals alternate between hard and then soft sickly sweet and I much prefer the former. ‘Life Changing’ and ‘Your Girl’ are new since I last saw her play. Nothing ‘Sweet’ about Pit Pony though and Jackie Purver on vocals gives them a Mysterines feel about them. Punk tendencies and raw energy from this Newcastle band – which is much more up my street.
Back to ARC for The Kites who have erected a huge banner at the side of the stage, plenty of support for them, particularly groups of younger girls who know all the words to ‘Emily Emily’ and ‘Drunk In Japan’ that they played twice for some reason. Sounding again like a Kooks tribute, plenty of catchy hooks but it all feels too safe and commercial, they are a perfect match for The Royston Club though, who will be on the same stage a little later.
In KU The Cheap Thrills are going down a storm with ‘Reborn’ and ‘Codependence’ their signature tunes, it’s kicking off and I can’t help but think they should have been in ARC instead of The Kites, yes it has that same catchy riffs but there is more passion and general rock ‘n’ roll from the Liverpool band.
About Bunny are lifting the roof of the Georgian Theatre with some full force punk attitude, led by Jemma McKenzie-Brown on vocals who apparently is Disney High School Musical 3 alumni (yes really!!), and she also admits to having a strong Hull accent when she’s in the North. The heat is taken up several notches here and another band on my must see again list. Lots of great female led bands around, About Bunny remind me of Panic Shack, Hot Wax, Mysterines and many others. ‘Married with Kids’ is a stellar song that deserves to be played loud.
Gallus I have seen before, but I find you are still never quite ready for the chaos they bring from Glasgow, vocalist Barry Dolan spends more time in the crowd than on the stage and at one point he’s bent double over the barrier. ‘Fruitflies’ opens the chaos and it doesn’t stop till ‘Looking Like A Mess’ends. They are supporting Dead Pony on their UK tour in December, so that will be off the charts spectacular.
After that anything was going to feel like an anti climax, so I’m sorry Stanleys and The Sheratons I didn’t stay too long with you, as it all sounded the same, more jingly jangly indie boys that I’ve heard earlier in the day. Borough Council in KU Bar didn’t lift the mood either with their introspective workings, although I think it was a case of wrong timing for me, and I’d probably enjoy them in a different environment, I quite like their Cure/Fontaines like feel. Snayx would provide the next excitement though and as ‘Work’ kicks in I get involved in the first proper mosh with us all singing “I stand up, I sit down, I get told to shut up” visceral punk ska from the South East. This is my second Snayx gig and both in Stockton. There are a couple of people wearing their shirts and I’d say more were here than I had expected.
I’m tempted to stay but want to catch a couple of The Royston Club before heading off for my headliner of the day. It was packed in ARC for them and so the only space was up in the balcony, they were late on stage but that didn’t matter as ‘Blisters’ starts a 15 song setlist guaranteed to keep all these punters happy. ‘Mrs Narcissistic’ is a personal favourite (try saying that after a few beers) and I’m wondering how many will leave early to catch CVC in KU Bar as that place will be full to the brim in no time. I didn’t attempt to go there, much as I like CVC, I had seen them in The Social Room earlier in the year for Stockton Calling and that is where I am heading again, this time for Swim School.
Having only seen them once at Kendal Calling 2023 I was very excited to be able to watch the whole set tonight, sadly the smoke machine meant I missed about a third of the stage but the sound was great and Alice Johnson has a star presence with her unique vocal style. ‘BORED’ might be being played but we were certainly not. “I can’t believe there aren’t more people here to see them” said the guy to my right, he wasn’t wrong, we were about 2/3rds full and it was such an incredible gig. ‘Kill You’ showed a softer side to Alice’s vocals and then ‘Give Me A Reason Why’ revealed a slight squeak, which I still can’t decide if I like or not, pretty sure it would grate after a while. ‘Delirious’ sparked some moshing at the front from a handful of people and shortly after that it was all over.
I chose correctly, but I did hear that both CVC and Overpass put in great sets too, so wherever you went for your final act you were catered for pretty well. The Gathering Sounds 2024, you could not have been better, Stockton -on-Tees you did it again, what a great all day festival, and one I hope to continue putting in my diary every year.
