From Select
It's quiet. Too quiet. Dubstar are on stage in half an hour but Chris Wilkie, their esprit de guitar. is slumped in the corner of the dressing room. He's experiencing one of the many 'advantages' of visiting Christiania - the housing estate-sized self-governing free state on the outskirts of Copenhagen. In fact, he's smoked so much of it that he can do little other than recite an unsettling mantra of Danish rock monickers gleaned from the venue walls. "Cellophane Aeroplane," he incants, "Sofamania, Slutspurt, Fup." Drummer Paul Wadsworth is wisely calling for a "resin curfew" but something more drastic is needed, something more animated.
"Bugger, I've dropped me eyelashes! Oh fuck! Ladies and gentlemen, Miss Sarah Blackwood. "Shall I wear me cardi tonight?" she asks of nobody in particular. "'Ere, who put fruit on the rider?"
With Chris struggling to overcome his Ueberstoner leanings, and Sarah grabbing another Spannerbrau from the table, the accusatory finger of citrus requisition inevitably points to the elected Dad of the whole proceedings, keyboard duce and self-proclaimed "fat guy from Dubstar", Steve Hillier.
After the release of the 'Stars' single last year, Dubstar fell victim to a variety of shorthand misnomers: St. Etienne, Portishead, The Pet Shop Boys... 'Disgraceful', the ensuing debut LP, was the epitome of 'intelligent', lah-de-dah pop sensibilities - anti-Patriarchy disco waltzes and chart singles detailing the assault of flat-bound pensioners - and yet, even to those who know anything about them, Dubstar are still two muso blokes from Gateshead and a conveniently attractive blonde vocalist.
After the downright rude pencil-case publicity for the album, An Evening With Dubstar is a suitably foul-mouthed cavalcade of backstage insults, self-deprecation and "long-distance cigarettes". The trio are surprisingly eager to convey a sense of on-tour conviviality, as if to dispel the deftly-marketed aura of "mystery" that surrounds them.
"Pfffhrrarrp!" Sarah cocks Chris' right arm until, by pressing his hand into his armpit, he is able to emit a trumpet-volume quack which serves to vent a certain amount of pre-performance pressure.
"Repetitive jokes," Steve explains. "Our life-raft."
Seconds before their entrance Sarah pronounces, "I can't go on, I'm still not pissed enough!" The weight of expectation that accompanies a Dubstar gig is evidently still too much, even for Blackwood and co's backstage brio, and as they walk onstage, every unit of 'Disgraceful''s sales drags behind them like Marley's chains.
As 'St Swithen's Day' begins, the amoral, antimonian farting Dubstar is replaced by the 'cool', sulky, don't-do-very-much-onstage-at-all Dubstar. Despite the 'Please Smoke Your Hash Outside' signs that festoon the venue, the audience are as inanimate as the band - two hundred Scandinavian intellectuals stare at three shy musicians. Eventually, the Pye Records meets Mo War invention of 'Not Once, Not Ever' and 'Anywhere' melts a selection of Scandinavian cold fronts but the mood is more akin to a lecture on Danish Bacon than an actual gig.
Post-facto and Chris Wilkie is holding court as a tearful Sarah rails against faulty monitors. "No, I'm not too happy with the name," he admits. "Like Echo And The Bunnymen. Great band, bloody awful name."
Tonight was not a good night and the band's discomfort is compounded by a shiny-faced Jeff Koon-alike 'fan' from Aberdeen informing everyone of how crap they were. "Yeah," adds Sarah in coda, "and I haven't changed my socks since Helsinki."
Next day, Sonderburg, themost violent city in Denmark, home to Absolutely Fuck All, welcomes Dubstar.
"Well, sometimes we get some people..." says the man who is Sonderburg Hall, scratching his chin, "sometimes four, five people. They leave... just band in building." Tonight, however, the Mayor is coming. Dubstar are an event. Back in the tour bus an endearingly crumpled Paul Wadsworth is having a little trouble adjusting. "I still haven't come back from Christiania," he proffers.
The rest of the band, however, are 'up for it'. Sarah is threatening a rude-word version of 'The Day I See You Again' and Chris has become a diminutive David Lee Roth, promising "All killer. No filler." Still, appearing in front of a coach party of Aryan mountaineers on the set of Hi-De-Hi would phase anyone and they begin nervously. Even when 'Not So Manic Now' rocks in, it still feels stilted and it's not until the Northern opera of 'The Day I See You Again" and a new track "Tell Me" that it all becomes clear. Dubstar are a Missing Link - the connection between The Smiths' bedroom poetry and Soft Cell's Mecca electronica. Tonight there's even a veiled cover of Gary Numan's 'I Die, You Die'.
They'd deny it, but Dubstar's sound is as rigidly '80s as their "indie" anti-image. A sugary romp through 'Popdorian' eventually instigates some front-stage frugging, but it's Sarah's revelatory acapella version of Janis Joplin's 'Mercedes Benz' that finally wins over everyone. Except, that is, for a strange bearded chap at the back who keeps shouting and pointing to the floor. The best 'erudite' indie electronic band in the world? Probably...
ANDREW MALE