The Rrrs at The Fly

The Rrrs at The Fly

21 July, 2008
by: Evolmike

Met Sharzilla Moog at the entrance. She's quite the whirling dervish of organisational steam, that one. At any one time she can be seen in several different places at once in the venue, gallivanting around in her technicolour dream coat, squeaking charmingly at how cool everything is. Nevertheless, this is but a fraction of the frenzied kinesis that she and The Rrrs undergo onstage.

There is a certain glorious dementia at play here. She sports the beaming ear-to-ear grin and football-sized eyes of someone dangerously high on life, matched by the charged reggae-pop sounds behind her, with syncopated beats and fast, heavily compressed guitars. Not a measure goes by without a cheerful melody or a leaping, staggered glissando to fill it. It is so happy and sweet and full of life that it's almost disconcerting. I don't know who to compare them to, but try to imagine Super Furry Animals at double speed.

Ah yes... the voice. For those of you still unsure, yes that really is her voice. It hasn't been sped up. It's one of the most bizarre voices I've ever heard. It's not high in a forced, falsetto way. It sounds like a deep voice under the influence of a lot of helium. At first, you're sure you're listening to a cartoon and you can't quite get over it. Personally I've warmed to it with a few listens, I think it fits the music like a glove (a petite, bright pink driving glove) especially with lyrics that are slightly obtuse and occasionally quite insightful (and it probably helps that I've learned to associate it with an incredibly hot, captivatingly crazy girl.) Though to be fair, I can kind of see why it puts some people off. There's such a thing as too distinctive.

The Fly is so strewn with balloons and other such children’s party paraphernalia that you almost forget that you're in a dark basement bar in central London. They even hired a midget comedian to warm the crowd up for them, and I'm thinking "now THIS is a band that goes that extra mile." I'd be interested to see what they'd do with a venue if they had complete aesthetic control over it - It'd be like a party inside a giant fruit salad. Not one for the old fogies among us. Tonight's set was short, comprised of a mere five or six songs, which was a shame but it certainly left me wanting more. Do they have more? Or is this a bit of a one-trick pony? We'll see.

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Evolmike