Thundermother/Beth Blade & The Beautiful Disasters/Haxan - Bannerman's, Edinburgh 6th April 2022

Haxan were up first. Apparently, this was the three wee Welsh lassies’ first visit to Edinburgh and, sadly, they were greeted with a parking ticket from City of Edinburgh Clowncil within about 5 minutes of arriving at the venue. A good crowd had turned up early to hear them though and they were much more welcoming. I had seen the girls twice before, most recently just down the road at the excellent Wildfire festival last year, but for many, this was the first taste of the band, so hopefully the impressed punters bought enough t-shirts and copies of their ‘White Noise’ album to cover the costs. They might be wee in stature but they make a BIG noise and songs like ‘Killing Time’, ‘Grave Digger’ and especially ‘Skeletons’ were very well-received.

Beth Blade and her Beautiful Disasters are already well-known and loved in Edinburgh on the strength of previous performances and they absolutely smashed it again. Beth herself is a strong and charismatic front-person and just keeps getting better – as do the three Disasters who are the token penis-owning performers of the evening, including Luke who shines on guitar as usual. It’s a bit of a sausage-fest in the audience too, and the guys and the handful of girls lap up already classic songs like ‘Give it all You’ve Got’ and ‘I Ain’t Got Nothing (if I Ain’t Got Rock n Roll)’ but the band also impress on three brand new songs that got an outing. There is a new album in the works and you can find out how to help on the band’s page. At the end of the set, they played a Foos’ song in tribute to Taylor Hawkins and I had feared that this may cost us a run-out for ‘Jack and Coke’ but they manage to squeeze that in too. I will look forward to seeing the band on the Saturday at FiendFest in November but hopefully I’ll not have to wait that long to hear more from them.

Sweden’s Thundermother are the headliners and they turn it up to 11 from the start and deliver one of the best and most entertaining sets I’ve seen in a long time. They do indeed bring the thunder in a bludgeoning Airbourne meets Bonafide heavy style but with a great set of songs and all overlaid by the swaggering, blues-tinged vocal delivery of Guernica Mancini. They smash through a few selections from ‘Heat Wave’ to start, and also set their stall out with their signature song ‘Hellevator’ with its ‘dirty, dirty, bad-ass chicks’ statement refrain. It is a heat wave in the hall and the band’s satin jackets don’t last long. Guernica also quaffs a rare onstage beer for ‘hydration’ purposes – they’ve got their own branded beer back home but this was just a Sol. Midway through the set, we were treated to a world premiere with the first live outing for the band’s new single ‘Watch Out’ which was released two days after the show and is excellent.

‘The ‘newbie’ in the long-running band is bass-player Mona ‘Demona’ Lindgren, who looks a bit like a more rock n roll Mila Kunis and forms a very tight rhythm section with Emlee Johansson. Guernica attracts most of the attention and orchestrates the action but this has been Filippa Nassil’s band for a long time and she grabs the spotlight with a stunning walkabout during a ‘We Fight for Rock n Roll / Fight for Your Right to Party’ mash-up and peels off a string of well-known guitar parts from the middle of the crowd, including some Maiden, Hendrix, Kansas and James Bond. They wrap it up with a thrilling ‘Driving in Style’ and left the audience wanting more, but hopefully the warmth of the reception will be sufficient to tempt the ladies back up to Scotland again and they’ll be very welcome.

This really was a quality show from start to finish – the kind of hot and heavy night that makes you believe that live music really is coming back to life and I can’t think of a better way to spend a wet Wednesday. Hopefully we’ll seeing and hearing a lot more from each of the bands soon.