3/11/2012 Maleficent Upstairs at The Garage

Subject	Maleficent Upstairs at The Garage
DateCreated	11/5/2012 6:35:00 AM
PostedDate	11/4/2012 10:35:00 PM
	Saturday finds me down in Islington for a Halloween themed night. A quick pint or two in the pub first to avoid paying £4.60 for a Newcastle Brown in the venue, then I'm off to the gig. It's not a particularly busy night Upstairs at The Garage.  Maleficent are the reason for me getting on the train into town this evening. However, they aren't having a good night. The start of their set is delayed by about 15 minutes due to some problem with their laptop. There is much fiddling about and both band and audience are getting restless by the time their show eventually starts. It had seemed that the band had been heading away from relying on such technical stuff and were becoming much more of a real live band. However, tonight shows up some cracks as the band seem either unwilling or unable to just start the show in the old fashioned way - just count 1-2-3-4 and launch into it. The actual show is good visually - entertaining and interesting, but the sound is muddy and indistinct tonight - not the band's fault. Maleficent's mixture of Goth, industrial, and metal is well played, while the ballet influence adds a more twisted classical influence visually - you can tell some effort has really been put into this to provide a good show. It's not really the band's night and although they perform well the sound is poor and the set is short - hopefully things will go better for them next time... After Maleficent finish their set the crowd thins out rapidly, and I decide to do the same. Back to the pub for some very nice beer from Lithuania.