"Britpop survivors collaborate", that's the way Timeout summed up The North Sea Scrolls. That's selling the whole thing a bit short... Composed of musicians Cathal Coughlan and Luke Haines plus globe trotter / music journalist Andrew Mueller, The North Sea Scrolls was first aired at last year's Edinburgh festival. The show offers an alternative history of Britain where Oswald Mosley is lord protector, Enoch Powell a member of 70's prog rock outfit Gong and Chris Evans a martyr. A studio recorded version of the show has just been put out by Fantastic Plastic records and the small tour promoting it included 2 evenings at St Pancras Old Church.
For that second London date the place was packed (maybe because of that "attractive" blurb in Timeout...). Each song in the show was preceeded by a short story narrated by Muller (so hilariously good that even he struggled to keep a straight face). To give some gravitas to the proceedings, all 3 men were wearing pith helmets with added white army jackets with medals in the case of Coughlan and Muller. Songs are divided half between Haines and Coughlan. Haines songs are full of his usual lyrical wit (special mention to Enoch Powell : Space Poet) and catchy melodies, while Coughlan's ones need more repeated listenings to be fully appreciated. To add some extra sonic oomph to the Keyboard and Acoustic Guitar set-up, a Cellist was there (Audrey Riley). After concluding by inviting the audience to join in for "The Anthem of the Scrolls", the band came back for a triumphant four song encore composed of Microdisney and Luke Haines solo songs.
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