Public Service Broadcasting

The latest gig on our A to Z Musical Tour was ……

Public Service Broadcasting

For those unfamiliar with the band, their stage names hark back to an era of P J Wodehouse – J. Willgoose, Esq., Wrigglesworth, J F Abraham and Mr B who are the beating heart of the band. They extend this image of days gone by, dressing like teachers or tutors at university with their corduroy jackets, trousers, shirts and ties.

When we think of concept albums, Pink Floyd’s The Wall, The Beatles Sergeant Pepper or The Who’s Quadrophenia may spring to mind.

Public Service Broadcasting take the concept in another direction, combining archival materials from digital libraries around the world with the sounds of drums, guitar, bass, brass and an assortment of other instruments interwoven as required. It’s a combination that works on different levels. Musically and historically.

Their subject matter to date includes the space race, mining communities in Wales, the history of the BBC, the Titanic and, with the latest release The Last Flight, the story of Amelia Earheart’s attempt to fly around the world.

Listening to the albums is a genuine education, with the archived material providing genuine context to the music. The narrative is told from the perspective of the people involved at the time, lending authenticity to the songs being played as an accompaniment to these moments in history.

And so, as they strode on to The Barrowland’s stage to the setting of Earheart’s cockpit, the question was, how would they deliver a show with a setlist populated by the visual and aural archived materials?

With Mr B in control of the visuals and other archived materials, the band played the perfect backdrop to the stories being told.

Many of the vocal duties required on the night were taken up by singer songwriter Eera who added a wistful twist to the songs. The brass section added the funk to several songs when taking centre stage, especially on Gagarin, whipping the audience up into a heaving mass of dancing, clapping and choral singing.

An audience highlight was the Space Race focussed Go! which closed the show before the encore. To the backdrop of the mission control archive material the words Go! and Stay! reverberated around the ballroom.

The set finally closed with Everest, an apt title describing how the band climbed to the summit of expectation at The Barrowland Ballroom and, as they looked round from on high, they must have been exhilarated by the response from everyone in front of them.

Whether the journey was by plane, spaceship, boat or rail, Public Service Broadcasting provided a unique musical experience as we departed into the Glasgow night with more knowledge of the past.

Support Halo Maud

French chanteuse Halo Maud opened up the show to a well populated ballroom and her mix of guitar laden songs allied to angelic vocals harked back to the songs of Bjork. With the support of her rhythm section, the set was entertaining and appreciated by those in front of her. Unknown before the evening, her music has an alluring quality, partly driven by her accented vocals and with her latest album released earlier this year, is likely to garner a few more fans as a result of this tour.

Merci Maud!