The Big Pink - The Duchess, York - 17/10/09

York: The walled city of the North is more a place you'd associate with Horn-blowing Vikings and pan-piping Hobgoblins, than the The Big Pink. Nonetheless they graced The Duchess' stage and fitted in well, wearing studded leather and a lot of black.

Listening to their album A Brief History of Love it is clear The Big Pink's sound is multi-layered, mixing traditional electric guitars with more electronic sounds, and this interesting song construction is only further emphasized on hearing them live. Multi-layered and multi-faceted, their patch-working of different musical genres is compelling, but this self-reflexive attitude to music's history doesn't take away from the fact that they feel pure and fresh, not at all like a re-hashed My Bloody Valentine, though this would be no bad thing.

The wailing vocal of Robbie Furze, central to their song-craft was even more haunting live, and his cover of Otis Redding's 'These Arms Of Mine' was wonderful, beautiful. The minimalist cover was so unpretentious and honest (a trait Otis' shares) that it seemed almost natural for it to form part of their set. Keeping conversation to a minimum, their subtle musical interludes retained the crowd's interest and made for a continuous and compelling set. Although the Duchess' stage leaves much to be desired - its lights wouldn't look out of place at an awkward high school disco - the little box of a stage made for an intimate performance, pushing the sound directly at its fans.

Overall, The Big Pink live does everything a band should do: so much better than listening to their album really loud at home, their sound was less clipped, less commercialized, more poetic. In the context of an already saturated music industry, their genre-crossing style is difficult to categorize, increasing their potential for longevity; if they continue to play gigs in the same way, I see no reason why they won't continue to grow in success.

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