This review taken from HermAphrodite #10.

Cheesecake Truck

Anti-Product… and…

London’s Garage - 02/08/00

Bands are cut from many different cloths. Some from shiny leather, some beige linen, others something altogether sparkly and opaque. But the bands on this Org-roster evening seem to’ve been sewn together from the scraps left-over, each head-shakingly astonishingly individual, and each with a beguiling Raggedy-Anne piece-meal patchwork feel. Here, while the music is of quality, it is the Spectacle which is of paramount importance. (Debord & Greil Marcus’d be so proud.) To entertain and to dazzle, that seems the only intention. As we are incessantly shown…

We wander into the building with time enough to get drinks in before our first band of the night take to the stage. Such fortification soon seems far-sighted… Cheesecake Truck have chosen striking minimalism and gaffer-tape as twin themes for the evening, and as such are wearing little else. Streaked with white paint, and resplendent in gaffer-tape codpieces beneath pink-netting under-skirts, they screech their way through a full-on rock-set, barefoot wheeling about the stage. Very loud, very fast, very disturbing; even dressed as asexual dolls, they still come across as the onstage equivalent of Tourette’s. For me, however, the set’s hypnotic core was the anachronistically faced guitarist, who has the body of a guerrilla-ballerina, but the head of a 12^th Century yokel. But Guy of Gisbourne would never have been in a band like this…

‘Yeah, follow that’, seemed to be the unspoken taunt.

Well, someone had to…

And then we are met with Anti-Product. Who could be described as ‘Mad Max meets The Insect House at London Zoo’ …though it wouldn’t do them justice and would probably just confuse… their own name seems to fit their stance far better. Anti-Product are the blithe-chart antidote, and veering as they did between pop-tastic and power-punky, they made for easier listening than the gaffer-tape boys, and their ‘Supergirl’ had myself and Philippa jiving and twisting like a pair of Beehive’d boppers. And all this, apparently, is them on low power – tonight Anti-Product were playing unplugged. Which seemed to involve the lead singer (like Keith Flint’s dad singing Springsteen) perching on the edge of a table, with an acoustic guitar, and the rest of the band playing as normal. (Ah well. The thought was there…) Oh, and they got Jesus up onstage on the end. Jesus, a long grey-haired man who’d been passing out photocopied messages of love on A4 paper to those around him, when not attempting to join each set from the crowd, with his tambourine. As their final moment, Anti-Product got him to play maracas, and then covered The Small Faces…

‘Yeah, follow that’, seemed to be the unspoken taunt.

Well, someone had to…

The shocking-pink boa-ringed drumkit materialises. Philippa target-locks her Stealable Coat-Dar onto a very bright white furry jacket onstage before her. And guitar-dervish Alex appears, on penguin (distribution) duty. Ceramic, inflatable, and the inescapably fluffy, they are balanced on amps, arranged on monitors, perched on keyboards. It’s a veritable invasion of penguin proportions, and suddenly makes me feel very grateful the new album isn’t to be themed around llamas (they worry me) or jelly-fish (which worry everyone). But tonight isn’t just about penguins. Oh no… Tonight is also about camels, moon-cheese, and alcohol. And maybe a smidgeon of Vanilla Ice too. Oh yes… In keeping with the messy Mis-Shapes look of the evening, when the final ensemble wander onstage they are truly a joy to behold. Wildly excite-able Robin is a manic felon Cat in the Hat, beaming Chris a slick of sunshine construction-worker, Alex an unstoppably Catherine-Wheeling New York Doll, t’other spikier Chris as the world’s furriest hospital orderly, sometime David as a tights-wearing Paul Stanley and then a mannequin Minnie Mouse… oh, and there’s also a 6ft penguin. On keyboards. Naturally. And the songs themselves are as varied & delightful as the band’s members… Bouncing through the set like a hug-bubble, we finish up with the obligatory Kiss cover, and a ‘Blue Ice Cream’ for the New Millennium (which comes atcha like the Arctic Boosh meets… Rachel Stamp, I suppose…). Gawd bless ‘em, every one; this evening has truly kicked the arse of staid plaid rock, and brought us giggling into a new penguin-riddled dawn.

‘Kitsch’, in its original German form, means ‘an absolute denial of shit’, both literally and figuratively. Bands over, and heading home beaming, I realise the night has been very gloriously very very kitsch…

Last revised: 27/07/01