The memorable Swedish experimental rock outfit GOAT gave Glasgow a performance to remember on their sold-out UK tour.
The Glasgow stop of the tour had a somewhat confusing change of times and venues from the Garage to the QMU and as support act Japanese Television came on to a nearly empty room, a few people may have been worried that a large amount of the crowd were in the wrong venue. However, once the dirty bass kicked in the room quickly filled with an audience that mostly seemed to be made up of either students or elder bohemians. Japanese Television aren’t a band of a lot of words and the instrumental four-piece didn’t try to make up for their lack of lyrics with crowd work, which was relegated to a “Thank you very much” after every other song. However, the band’s clear concentration and enjoyment while playing a soundscape of psychedelic rock makes for an endearing and enjoyable performance that the crowd is clearly loving.
GOAT come on to dimmed lights over the ominous monologue of “Soon you Die” and as the first few masked members of the band arrived it started to feel more like Squid Games than was perhaps intended; that atmosphere did not last long however as the 2 lead singers burst on stage in their more flamboyant and recognisable folk masks. Like Japanese Television before them there was no banter to be had from this band who kept in character throughout. This was the performance the crowd came to see though, and it was exciting to see such an atypical band get a room full of people dancing to the point the floor shakes.
The dual lead singers kept up such high levels of energy throughout the performance that the crowd didn’t have much choice but to join in and it made for a thoroughly wholesome atmosphere. The set was relatively evenly spread through their 10-year-old catalogue, with some of the crowd favourites being new tracks like “Under No Nation” which is a good sign for a band of their age. That doesn’t mean that the fans were left without the big hits though, as “Let it Burn” led the crowd into the encore and “Run To Your Mama” brought the house down to a roar of approval.
On first impressions GOAT might be considered a bit of a novelty act but performances like tonight’s show that they are far from it. Nobody, from their decade-old fans to people who turned up not knowing what to expect will be forgetting that show any time soon.
Words & pictures: Dale Harvey @daleharvey