I first unearthed The Duke Spirit seven long, largely tolerable years ago as they supported the now-defunct Hope Of The States (R.I.P.) before a projection of a florid moon in the doldrums of Camden's Electric Ballroom. Keeping things eclectic, they've always opted for intriguing, at times uncomfortable warm-up acts, and it's at this precise point that
The Computers are interpolated into proceedings; that's how they've wound up onboard the Thekla, hurling enough spit from their relatively eloquent gobs to suggest an adolescence of having to hold it in for seemingly endless car journeys. Opener Where Do I Fit In? startles the visibly apprehensive mass, as if their earlobes were imminently to be pinned back by jumpleads then fed beneath the bonnet of a battered old Jeep. Jeff completely loses it, and later provides piggybacks for exuberant frontman Alex Kershaw who delivers the second half of a veritably hell-raising, blood-curdling set on the creaking boards of the "dancefloor" as an anxious roadie gazes on painstakingly from the third row, expectant of impending chaos. Essex isn't famed for Costello quiffs and Rocket From The Crypt raucous-cum-
Mark Sultan ramshackle, although on tonight's evidence perhaps it ought to be: The Queen In 3D sounds like a hillbilly Baddies entrapped in a Boss SD-1, whilst the visceral Blood Is Thicker rips through all before it like a burgeoning coastal hurricane. Bemoaning the spotlessness of their washed out white stage costumes, roisterous closer Please Drink Responsibly ensures further laundering is required as spit, sweat and Red Stripe streams pervasively throughout the venue. Fuck knows what they're doing toting Rickenbacker 330s, why they're signed to
One Little Indian, why they're called The Computers when there's nowt electronic in sight, or quite how they ended up on the road supporting The Duke Spirit but when they're capable of exuding such uncontaminated vitriol, even when the room's barely a third full, who the fuck even cares.
