Bear Arms First Gig!

Pivo Pivo 13/02/10

I knew it was Bear Arms first gig, and I was apprehensive. The band set up, looking focused but nervous. The audience echoed their nerves; the crowd was full of their friends and family, who were willing them to uphold the expectations that their demos for Wolves and Directions had created.

It was about thirty seconds into their first song, Perfect Symmetry, I realised that my cheekbones were actually hurting from smiling.

The noisy collective of sound quite perfectly encapsulates how together this exceptionally new band are. The crashing symbols, hypnotic base and understated guitar riff, followed by lead singer Richard’s dulcet, yet not forced, Scottish tones create something that does not in anyway sound like a first gig.

Continuing into To Whom it May Concern, the audience were graced with more of the same audio bliss.

The harmonies between Richard and Keiran are so perfect and natural that they’ve either been practicing everyday for the last five years, or they have a natural collaboration that most vocalists would glow green with envy at.

As a whole, the band are so in tune with each other; they’ve mastered both their loud, gritty, rocky moments, along with the beautifully quiet and eerie moments in their songs. One of which that most definitely stands out is their cover of The Counting Crows song, Colour Blind.

Their penultimate song, Wolves, brought the gig back up to tempo from the softer interlude of Colour Blind. Again you could feel the excitement in the audience as they listened live to the talked about demo track. The whippingly fast drumming of the chorus along with the strong detached chords leave you with no option but to bop your head along in time.

The fans that they brought with them were suitably brought together with the new ones that were created in the room that night as they bopped, nodded and internally rocked out to the band.

Closing with the title track from their EP, Directions, it’s safe to say Bear Arms suitably astounded the audience with their debut performance. The collective strength of each band member’s musical talent and the time and effort they have clearly put in to make their sound so polished and audibly perfect makes them, as a band, jaw-droppingly, cheekbone-hurtingly and generally awesome to spectate.

Bear Arms includes: Richard Wardrop - Vocals/Guitar, Keiran Hird - Vocals/Guitar, Lewis Mcgourty - Bass and Ben Sneddon - Drums.

Check them out on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/beararmsuk

Or on twitter: @beararmsmusic