Taking my constant nipping over the Welsh border into England out of the equation, I’ve never travelled ‘abroad’ to a gig before, but if any band is worth doing this for it’s Wire. And as it meant I was going to finally get to meet my long-time email buddy Glenn and his lovely family, it seemed too good a trip to turn down.
This was obviously also a gig of some significance in the history of Wire – not only was it their first date for four years (not for the first time in the bands history it had long since started to look like it was all over!), it was also the first with a different line-up with Bruce Gilbert having left and being replaced by Margaret Fiedler McGinnis, formerly of Laika and PJ Harvey’s live line-up.
It was perhaps inevitable therefore that this date (in a small and intimate venue in a picturesque Belgian city), should take a while to get going – literally at first with Robert having forgotten something or another and nipping off-stage before they’d even started. Still, as Graham Lewis pointed out in response to a ‘Come on’ from a member of the audience, ‘You’ve waited thirty years, you can wait thirty more seconds’. They opened with a new number from the forthcoming Object 47 LP, which showed the band going off in a more melodic direction than the Send-era material. Our Time followed, although surprisingly this was (if I remember correctly!) the only number they played from the excellent recent Read & Burn 3 ep. As you would probably expect from Wire, much of the set was made up of new material, most of which sounded promising as opposed to mind-blowing on first listen although I certainly know better than to write this material off. One new number featured Graham on lead vocals and featured a chorus that was (bizarrely!) reminiscent of Julian Cope, whilst another saw Colin and Graham on duel vocals for the chorus. There was also the odd oldie like Mr Marx’s Table (which was played early on and didn’t quite ignite for me) and Comet, whilst Being Sucked In Again also made a somewhat unexpected appearance.
The gig really kicked in though with a couple of back to back Read & Burn 1 and 2 tracks, with Graham excelling on a ‘he means it maaan’ version of Agfers Of Kodack followed by a great version of I Don’t Understand, which with its classic Wire guitar inter-changes and Bolan-like swagger, has always been a favourite of mine. It was all over too soon although we did get treated to not one, not two, but THREE encores starting with a rare live showing of a Mk II Mute era track Boiling Boy (undoubtedly one of their finest moments from that under-rated period IMO). It was a nice, almost subdued version which kicked on nicely about halfway through when Graham suddenly injected a bit more oomph to proceedings. This was followed by the poptastic The 15th and a lightning fast 12XU. The other encores featured Pink Flag, 106 Beats That and a great version of the classic Lowdown. They then left the stage with Graham leaving his amp on and creating some horrible mindf**k of a noise on constant loop.
So was it a vintage show? No, being perfectly honest it wasn’t. Was it good to have them back? Yes, it certainly was - I certainly enjoyed seeing the metronomic Robert Gotobed drumming away, eyes closed, again! - and Margaret was most impressive chugging away on guitar. I think that with a few more dates behind them to iron a few glitches, they could soon be back to their best.
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