The Pierces are two sisters from the deep south living in New York. Catherine, currently engaged to our headliner for tonight (just an aside for you celeb gossip type folks) and Allison have been both been blessed with above average looks, pleasing stage personalities and luckily—most importantly—they can sing.
Opening with a Celtic duet which I’d like to think was rolled out especially for Scotland, The Pierces manage to be very laid back in front of their first Glasgow audience with Catherine taking the lead mostly and Allison seeming just that bit nervy or quieter. Very soon it becomes apparent that the airy pop production on some of their recorded material and the precisely styled image of promo pics & videos isn’t what these lassies are really about. Third track Lights On pumps the live electric bass at me so strongly I forget this is the tune we’d listed as least favourite and too singalong poppy fluff while listening before the show. It’s not just the bass that’s been turned up either, with Catherine using her lungs to full advantage to make sure everyone was sitting up and taking notice. Two songs later and Go To Heaven gives Allison her turn to turn on the vocals and let us know that she’s just as strong as her sister, although the quieter moments of the song are blighted by the ABC 2’s acoustics favouring those idiots holding conversations at the back rather than the stage PA.
The set ranges across a wealth of influences with at one point the hookline of “cross my heart and hope to die” floating over a tune that started out as Celtic, veered into French burlesque cabaret and kept time throughout with gypsy beats. Boring can only properly be described as a tongue-in-cheek Shirley Bassey Bond theme and Sticks and Stones closes their time on stage with a rousing, foot-stomping number that has much of the crowd clapping along.
Of course most of the crowd were there to see Mr. Albert Hammond Jr., normally of The Strokes & scene-cool indie rock legend, and the reaction to the indie-rocking chiming guitar intro reveals that. The set however doesn’t quite suit me: each song the band plays has a great intro and a hook hanging around in it somewhere, but too often they sound overly familiar to me. I spend my time entertaining hopes of this one being a goodie and lifting me onto a gig high, but I’m always dropped back by the end of the first verse. Everything seems alright and I’m sure if they left behind the wavy fingered keyboardist and visited on a drunken weekend night then I’d be cheering on the crazy-eyed rockiness along with the die-hard fans and shouting for a Strokes song with the rest of the crowd. Tonight I’m content to enjoy the insight that sometimes, just sometimes going solo reveals an artist to have left behind an important part of what made them good.
