Yummy Fur

With Normal Service and The Mary Column

The Old Hairdressers, 7 March

Serendipitous connections. That’s what took me to The Old Hairdressers to see Yummy Fur.

In August last year, Belle & Sebastian were the headline act at The Glasgow Weekender where bis were one of the top draws of that weekend too.

bis who then went on to headline their own 30^th anniversary a few weeks later where both Lung Leg and Yummy Fur were performing in a supportive capacity.

Yummy Fur were ‘new’ to me that night, or so I thought, before a wee bit of research for the blog led me to find out that front man John McKeown, was a founding member of the 1990s, a band that had given me a great deal of pleasure listening to over the years.

And tonight, with both Normal Service and The Mary Column having some connection or other to Lung Leg, it felt as if the gang were all back together under one roof again.

Normal Service open up the night with some toe tapping instrumental tracks, with a few vocal lines dropped in here and there for good measure.

It would be fair to say the whole group have been around the block a few times and there is a cohesion across all the songs that practice, skill and experience brings to the stage. When the snare drum breaks midway through a song there were no tantrums, just a few nervous laughs until a replacement was found from one of the other bands that night. No drama, just enjoying the night like everyone else.

With the addition of flute and sax later in the set of nine songs, there is something both familiar, yet different, to the tracks played with Raljex and Ex two of the standout songs during their half hour or so playing.

The Mary Column had rather more indie rock’n’roll about them. Edging towards Nirvanaesque at times, several had that grunge feel with fuzz laden guitars to the forefront throughout.

Jack Mellin was the driving force on the night, though more than ably backed up by his bandmates.

As in the first two words of this post serendipitous connections, some further research shows that he’s involved with a number of musical projects in and around the city and beyond, a couple of which have found themselves being added to the collection at home. And another connection is Simone Wilson who shared the stage with Lung Leg at the bis gig in September too.

Some might say there are already too many unhealthy musical connections here however, given the songs and performances I’m sure this is what drew the crowd to come and see everyone on show before them.

Yummy Fur, have been around for a while and have had several breaks for a while too, along with several changes to band personnel during this time.

On the night, the four on stage gave a captivating performance across 14 songs that captured the best of their back catalogue together with a couple of new songs that sounded equally good.

Inevitably some songs rose above the really good, with Policeman and The Canadian Flag two particular highlights on the night.

John McKeown was in self-deprecating mode throughout, though it would be unfair to agree with his comment that ‘Yummy Fur were probably the third best band on the bill!!’

There is little doubt that Yummy Fur were the headline act on the night. That a couple had travelled all the way from Denmark to see them is testimony to the wider geographic appeal their music has.

Jangly guitars. Short sharp songs. Tight musicianship and very much an attitude of ‘let’s make this show a good night for everyone that’s taken the time to come out and see us play.’