Limerick to Shoreditch: The Rogues' Progress

The Rubberbandits:  XOYO, Cowper Street, London, Sunday, 27 November

The Rubberbandits UK tour finished on a high note in London’s trendy Shoreditch at the weekend and The Deptford Croppy crossed over the water to watch.

Shoreditch; the very name filled me with dread but we resolved to press on nevertheless; over the river and into the deserted City, winding up Commercial Road and finally into the Heart of Darkness...or Islington anyway.

XOYO: even its mission statement resonates with portent... “XOYO is a dynamic space across two floors profiling a mixture of Art, Music, Culture and Media events. We see ourselves as a living, breathing hub, creating touchpoints across these activities...”

And in spite of that, we still we pressed on; such was our desire to see the Rubberbandits.  Besides, it wasn’t all that bad once we got there.

Even if it was a bespoke dynamic space (or sumthin); XOYO still felt pretty much like any other music venue in which I’d ever had drink spilled on me or my feet trodden upon; which was nice and comforting to an old-timer like yours truly.

The crowd had a predictably large Irish contingent but there was also a healthy smattering of ‘hipsters’ (but you can’t call them that, they don’t like to be called hipsters, as the Rubberbandits were later to point out knowledgeably). And with that same kind of ironic remove and knowing distance, the opening act Massive Horse took to the stage a little bit like Jedward re-imagined as a situationist electric cabaret (and I mean that in a good way).

My Bad Sister were next up and in keeping with the off-kilter cabaret double-act theme of the evening, they were a sister act. Complete with DJ, masked assistants and some nifty dance routines, My Bad Sister got your attention straight away. Then their energy, banter and soulful harmonies held it. They had a real crowd-pleaser on their hands with their good old fashioned cockney mash-up; a cross between the Grange Hill theme and the lyrics of Only Fools and Horses’ Hooky Street . Gypsy Boy was another tune with a great hook, performed with verve.

But the evening in the end belonged to the Rubberbandits and they took the stage with as much swagger and poise as one can muster while wearing a plastic shopping bag like a ski-mask. Which actually turns out to be plenty. 

Blindboy and Mr Chrome have a good line in call and response rapping and toasting as they spit the lines and rhymes between them ‘just like their hero Tupac’.  In ‘Pure Awkward’, the lads are presented with a social dilemma when, while smoking rock with Ice Cube (as you do), the rapper comes on to them with a raging hard on.  

The Rubberbandits are already seasoned performers and the act is well-honed, not unlike Mr Chrome’s abs.  It’s easy to forget that it is an elaborate construct, particularly when the tunes are this catchy.

After involuntarily humming  the ‘Go Compare tune’ running  through my head like a scratched record for months now, it was a genuine  relief to find my myself singing ‘Fuck your Honda Civic, I’ve a horse outside’. Or ‘A bag for me, a bag for you, let’s get wrecked on bags of glue’.

‘Up the Ra’ is a tough one to explain to a British audience; especially as there may be many in the crowd for whom the irony of the device of the unreliable narrator is not really hitting home. But it works in the end and the list of IRA members grows ever more improbable. My favourite: ‘Frodo Baggins? He’s in the Ra.’

The Rubberbandits manage to do the clever stuff as well and do it without being overly self-conscious.  I laughed out loud as they marvelled at the tube; it’s like downloading yourself to different parts of the city.

Blindboy’s solo on the quirky 'Spastic Hawk' and the dark cheeriness of 'Spoiling Ivan' (a song about the love of a man for a six year old boy) give you an inkling that there’s much more going on here than New Jack City with a Ballynanty Beg accent.

But they do that schtick so well. ‘I Wanna Fight your Father’ is about that age old conflict for young star-crossed lovers. ‘Your Daddy said he’s sussed me out, he says I’ll break your heart, but if your Daddy had a busted mouth, he wouldn’t be so smart’. (Their London encore begins with the Irish language version of the same.) ‘Black Man (In My Gang)’ is proof of the same, if more were needed. Of course Horse Outside, which is the song that ends the show, is pure joy.

The Rubberbandits’ sense of humour isn’t just culture specific; a lot of it is probably city particular. But once you buy in to the idea of how Limerick is perceived (ie as hotbed of criminality and social deprivation) and how Limerick people actually perceive themselves, then The Rubberbandits experience is a very satisfying one.

By and large, they manage to get that parochial set-up established for the joke to work. The whole Willy O'DJ construct is a rich and hilarious back-story all of its own (As well as being a former Minister of Defence, 'He's not my father, he's my mother's boyfriend'...). Explaining ‘Double-dropping Yokes With Eamonn De Valera’ as being analogous to 'Doing Es with Benjamin Disraeli' was a nice turn and all.  

The Rubberbandits?  Worth braving Shoreditch for. 

The album Serious About Men goes on sale on 02 December


For a sort of an interview/Q&A type of a thing with the Rubberbandits, click here.