Photos: Aleš Podbrežnik
Venue: Ljubljana, Sub Sub
Concert date: 13.11.2009
Attendance: 150
Ticket price: 7 €
In the club under Tivoli Hall, which used to be called Palma and now, slightly spruced up, goes by the name Sub Sub, the Littoral band Tide unveiled their third record. After a longer break from playing live, caused by lineup changes, during which Kevin Koradin recorded the album Regeneration in the Netherlands mostly on his own, the band was back on Ljubljana stages. The new album is a bit more laid-back than their earlier stuff, and the different sources of musical inspiration the author drew from are much easier to spot now, ranging from Joy division and New order all the way to giants like U2 and the Beatles. Regeneration is a pretty likeable eclectic album, with a poetic sensibility that stays anchored in the past, while the production and the (slightly overdone) use of samples plug it into modern rock that sits somewhere between alternative and mainstream. By the way, you can check out Rockline’s review of the album here:
The show kicked off at 10:30 PM, set in motion by the synthetic drums of the first track, Regeneration, and to their beat Koradin and company took over the modest but no less famous stage of this legendary Ljubljana club. Over a good hour and a half they served up the new songs, a few of which you can already catch on local radio stations, plus a handful of covers and older originals too. Waste no time, Release my gun, Best friend, Reptiles, Love train, Evolution, Waiting for the rain and the Lennon-McCartney-style Let me sleep all rushed past us. The most likeable chapter of the new album is the single Adieu, though it leans way too heavily on the lyrics of Andrew Eldritch and the gloomy Sisters of mercy to sound truly convincing and authentic. Otherwise, Tide nailed the performance, and Koradin even pulled off a few acrobatic moves whenever he put his guitar down, something we weren’t used to seeing from the lanky guy with the unusually long arms. The sound was solid too, despite the small space, which means Sub Sub could be placed in that select category of pleasant, properly equipped Ljubljana venues with stages, alongside the somewhat better-established Orto. After the obligatory encore and band introductions, the group thanked the relatively sizable crowd, which included quite a few familiar faces from the showbiz scene, and, announcing that they’d be hanging around the club for a while for interviews and chats, retreated backstage.
So Regeneration is out in the shops. By our standards it’s definitely an above-average album, one that goes down easy and can’t leave us cold. If the guys keep up this pace and stick to the course they’ve set, they’ve got nothing to worry about in Slovenia. Of course, the English lyrics that run through all their records reveal a hunger to break through abroad, which, as some much bigger-sounding local names will tell you, is a whole different ballgame.
Photos: Tina Gačnik
Setlist
1. Regeneration 2. Waste no time 3. Release my gun 4. Like it slow 5. All the things 6. You 7. Best friend 8. Let me sleep 9. Reptiles 10. Guns in the sky 11. To be your lover 12. Love train 13. The urge 14. Don’t lose yourself 15. Adieu
Photo gallery
