Duncan ‘Kid’ Reid, former bass player of early punk band The Boys, returned to the club with his infectious pop-punk group The Big Heads following last year’s show at the venue, which was hindered by a blizzard.
The band are due to release their next studio album and played new songs from the record as well as from their previous ones, beginning on ‘Can’t Stop’, the opening track on their last album, ‘Bombs Away’.
Unfortunately, Sophie K Powers (guitar, keyboard) was unable to make the show due to being hospitalised and instead was replaced by a last-ditch guitarist who was only told at soundcheck that he would be playing.
The Big Heads played ‘Cest La Vie’, from ‘The Difficult Second Album’, with Reid mixing in his heritage Boys songs, performing ‘Soda Pressing’ and then going back to the new again, with ‘Welcome To My World’ and ‘Motherfucker’. The band also did their war themed title track, ‘Bombs Away’.
They went back further to their debut studio album, ‘Little Big Head’ with ‘Kelly’s Gone Insane’ and, after relating one of his true stories, Reid performed another new song. Two more Boys tracks followed, ‘Brickfield Nights’ and ‘Terminal Love’, the former with guitarist Nick Hughes on vocals. The band also ‘broke a record’ with ‘The Shortest Song In The World’, comtaining one lyric, “Stomp.”
The Big Heads finished their main set on Honest John Plain’s ‘First Time’, declaring The Boys were the best songwriters, and did an encore featuring yet another one of their songs, ‘TCP’, as well as Andrew Matheson’s Hollywood Brats classic, ‘Sick On You’, on which they ended their spectacular innings.
24/05/19: Duncan Reid & The Big Heads @ The 100 Club, London.
Photos © Kevin Shepherd.
© Ayisha Khan.