The Oxford Punt - 13/05/09 (unedited version)

Hardly projecting bands to instant stardom, The Oxford Punt's purpose is one of mutual support and camaraderie among the city's independent scene. Nearly five years of living in Oxford and I've only just managed to drag my disorganised ass to this.

With a bit of initiative, you can get your hands on 'The Punt Pass'. It grants the holder the freedom to stagger from pub to pub and witness as much, or as little, as desired. Very few would pass up the chance to wave a bit of laminated card in a bouncers face and tell them to fuck off.

But before this moment of justice, cast a dubious eye over the double page spread in May's Nighshift - the infamously opinionated, local music 'zine - and you'd be forgiven in thinking that no pub would survive an invasion of calculator wielding boffins. Throughout the feature, like a stutter, the word 'math' occurs over and over; but not without some justification of genre. Recently, Foals, The Young Knives and A Silent Film have come to define the sound of this ancient city brimming with technically intricate, smarter-than-the-average rock. Perhaps something uncontrollable would break through the fog of indie pop in the most pretentious city in the country?

Mini rockers Hearts in Pencil were the first. It was club indie, dangerously close to the Kooks, but rescued by an adventurous guitarist and a powerful bassist; who, for the sake of trendy style, kept stroking his fringe. Musically mature beyond their years, they ended with a track not too dissimilar from Fugazi's echoing dub-punk. A sturdy set, short enough to prevent the front-man's off key swagger from pissing me off.

One drink downed, and at a different venue, Mary's Garden displayed a more sombre tone. They have been playing in Oxford for four to five years in various forms. Think a more daring and distorted version of The Editors lead by an infinitely cooler, New Romantic Gwen Stefani (in sound not appearance). We were also tortured with a corporate presentation from A Response Collective, complete with bogus philosophy and shitty MS graphics projected on a large screen. This is what Nighshift calls electronic music? More like confused prog with lazy sampling. "Thank you for coming out instead of staying in and watching reality TV" said the guitarist. I spluttered in disgust and nearly sprayed cider out my nose.

This band/insult provoked my escape and I found musical sanity from a band called From Light In Sound at the next venue. With tremendous energy and fervour, it was clear that shoegaze was the collective theme of the evening because... adding bricks to this wall-of-distortion, Spiral 25 were also well received. Similar to the psychedelia of The Black Angels, they flooded the room in a dense fog, put on black sunglasses and drew forth waves of mystic, textured Rock.

A small diversion took me to see how Oxford favourites The Winchell Riots were holding up next door. Their cascading melodies and gripping stage presence have sustained their popularity; but I find them affected, contrived and in need of a sobering slap to awaken them from wistful delusions of grandeur.

Ending the night and appealing not only to the drunk half of the audience, The Original Rabbit Foot Spasm Band were well loved. They clearly struck an old school chord with their ram-shackled, thirties gangster jazz. Rest assured, The Oxford Punt had secured its reputation for another year.

(© Copyright 2009 Brendan Morgan)