Live report: 8th November 2010, SCOTT MATTHEWS(UK) + SISKIYOU(CAN) + RUBIK(FIN) at Maroquinerie, Paris

That night, there was Alina Olova who played at Café de la Danse, and the following artists at the famous Paris venue, la Maroquinerie:

Scott Matthews(UK): not his 1st Paris gig
Siskiyou(CAN): 1st Paris gig
Rubik(FIN): 1st Paris gig


This concert was unusual, I was sad to see the venue that empty. I went several times at this venue, but never saw a such intimate concert... I found it unfair for the very good bands who played that night, bands that French people should really discover. The concert started with the headliner, Scott Matthews, in this privileged setting. During the breaks, we could listen to songs of Elliott Smith in the venue...

Scott Matthews(UK)

MySpace / Facebook / Youtube / Website

8:30pm - 9:45pm.
 
This tall man was alone on stage with his four different guitars. Almost 1 hour and 15 minutes of performance, that means more than 16 songs, too long for a Monday night, but too short for most of his fans there. He actually took a lot of time to tune his guitars, changed guitars, and told stories in a very relax way and chatted well the audience of about 150 attentive people hidden in the dark. Most of them sat in circle on the floor and on the steps, or stood near the door. That was incredible for me to see that atmosphere in this venue, where I used to see it crowded with excited people dancing and screaming... I actually don't remember seeing folk and unknown bands there. Some of Scott Matthew's songs were good, but some others were also very boring for me, I almost fell asleep, as the songs were so calm. He has this particular warm voice that you might like or not and he is often compared with Jeff Buckley. You have to listen to his songs to know that. I quite liked his performance nevertheless.

Siskiyou(CAN)

MySpace / Facebook / Soundcloud / CBC Radio 3 / Website 

9:55pm - 10:25pm.

The venue was less crowded than it was for the previous artist. Is it because Siskiyou isn't well-known in France, or did people only come to see Scott Matthews, or is it a rainy Monday night in Paris, so people stayed at home? Sad fact. This recent band from Vancouver, Canada, never played in Paris before for this project and it was their 7th concert ever. If you never heard about this band, you probably heard about their frontman, Colin Huebert, who was the drummer of the great folk Canadian band Great Lake Swimmers and Eirik Arnesen who still plays guitar in this band. Colin has this heart-wrenching and crying voice that strengthens the interpretation of the songs. On the song 'Never Ever Ever Again', Eirik played saw at the beginning of the song, funny to watch. Their performance was good, even if they sometimes sang out of tunes. They didn't play only folk songs, as you might think, but also very dark and rock tunes. And they covered Neil Young 'Revolution Blues' as the last song, no encore.

Setlist ? :

Pull It Away

Funeral Song

Everything I Have

It's All Going To End

This Land

Never Ever Ever Again

Cover of 'Revolution Blues' by Neil Young

Rubik(FIN)

MySpace / Facebook / Twitter / Youtube / Website

10:45pm - 11:40pm.

The band I wanted to see that night came on stage at around 10:45pm. First Finnish band I saw live. I don't think that it was the best moment of the day to wake up, but it was one of the best moments I've ever had in concerts! These seven Finnish guys with long hair and/or beards played energetic and joyful music in the same kind of the Swedish I'm From Barcelona and the Norwegian Casiokids, who have the crazy power to make you feel happy immediately and participate to the show by clapping your hands or singing along, if you know the lyrics. They played almost all the songs from their last album 'Dada Bandits', released in Talitres Records in France, which is so good that I actually can't stop listening to it on Spotify...  But now, I have the LP, so I could listen to it outside, in the metro...

With their whole bunch of instruments (trumpet, saxophone, drums, percussions, keyboards, synthetisers, xylophone, tambourines, acoustic and electric guitars, weird instruments that produce birds sounds), and also with hands claps from all the members, you absolutely can't resist dancing on their songs and it's very entertaining to watch them dance, jump and singing on stage. Artturi Taira, the frontman of this band (who also plays in the band Kastor), has this particular voice that fits well the rythmic and colorful songs. No songs in Finnish, but all in English.

The Paris audience of about 60 lucky people, including some Finnish persons and enthusiastic French fans, was quite excited! Really nice performance! You could easily imagine all the people leaving the venue with a big smile on their faces. I was extremely happy that they played 'No Escape' for the encore! I can't wait to see them again! (Even the band Kowalski who played with them in Poitiers and that I met last Friday found that band excellent!)

Setlist (it's maybe the right one):

You Jackal!!

Goji Berries

Radiants

Richard Branson's Crash Landing

?

Indiana

Fire Age

Wasteland

Karhu Junassa

City and The Streets

[encore]

No Escape

Check out their Daytrotter session and KEXP live video of 'Goji Berries'.

Special thanks to the very nice Anssi I had the chance to meet briefly after the show. He plays "everything" in Rubik! Check out his excellent last EP with his own band Neufvoin, called 'Fake Musket' and produced by Artturi Taira! I wrote something about it here, if you missed it.

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Very nice review in French by Isatagada

Other reviews of their previous French gigs:
About their previous gig in Toulouse by Le Clou Dans La Planche.
About their previous gig in Bordeaux by Crystal Frontier and by Des Oreilles Dans Babylone. 

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And... I agree with what this American person thinks about Rubik after their show in Nashville in July 2010.
+ great interview here with two acoustic songs for MFMagazine (June 2010).