A Rock and Roll Week: Essential Logic and Gina Birch and the Unreasonables

Actually, that's completely wrong: rock and roll is a men's music label, and the punk-rooted music I'm going to be writing about owes little to standardised rock anyway. I think it's just that it feels as though that's what happened this week, according to my body and head!

Tuesday night at The Lexington was Essential Logic's triumphant return to London after what sounded like an amazing gig at the Paris Popfest. The whole night had been assembled with great care. DJ for the night was Estella Adeyeri, who in another guise sings and plays bass as part of Big Joanie. Her selection of tracks was perfect for the night and included Mind Your Own Business, an all-time favourite that is easy to overlook in the cacophony of great post-punk singles.

The first support act was The Exotic Pets, who had travelled from Birmingham for the gig. They were loud, confident and committed, and reminded me of The Ocees not only in their delivery, but also in their sound- and their ability to change mood mid-set and play a song that was much more contemplative than their more in-yer-face songs before returning to those more dynamic ones. Great music!

We were on next, and with Wing Commander Ruth Tidmarsh on bass and Wing Commander Robert Rotifer on guitar, it felt like a good chance to play the most political songs that I've written, including The Sea, a necessary dig at the fool politicians who stir hatred in people's hearts just for the craic. Ugh. I think we did a good set and it's always good to have the harmonies and the drive from Ruth and Robert.

Essential Logic have their own 'world' that they bring with them, a world of sound (oh, the interplay between Lora's sax and Marley's vocals!) driven along this night by pre-recorded drums and original member Phil Legge's thrashing guitar, the whole bound together by Lora's serenity. It was an utterly absorbing performance, impossible to look away from. Little Bruv had come along, and he remarked just how unexpectedly punk a sax is, and how natural it seems once you hear it. They finished with a blistering rendition of Oh Bondage, Up Yours!. Lora said it was just as good as Paris- which was great to hear. And the stars in the audience! Gina Birch (Raincoats), Lester Square (Monochrome Set), Lesley Woods (Au Pairs) and more.

The next night was Gina Birch and the Unreasonables at the 100 Club. They were supported by Taliable, who wore a mask and a ruff and who reminded me of one of my puppet people! They had a chap on decks and beats, and they were very LOUD but also very funny and friendly- they're a very good performer and we had a laugh in the dressing room afterwards as well.

Vanessa from Doc'n'Roll was projecting videos for Gina's set, and the three coloured crayons (orange, yellow and mauve) set off on their musical journey to an audience who were well up of it from the beginning. In the distance I spotted Lucy O'Brien, Nadia Buyse, Gemma Freeman, Kat Five (actually, I talked to those two!), my artist friend Charlotte Worthington and more, and more. This time I managed to get all the backing vocals right and had a good old sing. They went down a storm.

I love the defiance of this: pulling away from punk's sticky mud and making our lives into a new musical adventure. The template was there and the spirit is there, but this is new music from all of us, wherever we are on the scale of public profile or mediated success. The success is in still having ideas and still having the guts to go out there and share them. 

Long may we, our ideas, and our music reign!