Live Review: David Devant & His Spirit Wife, Micko Westmoreland & The Mellotronics @ The Islington, London

Given that he asserted in the future everyone would be famous for 15 minutes, it’s hard to know what Andy Warhol would have made of David Devant & His Spirit Wife’s career.

A major label deal and an upsurge of interest in their sound around the time of Britpop led to their second album, Work, Lovelife, Miscellaneous, reaching the dubious heights of no. 70 on the UK Album Chart. A couple of singles came even closer to the elusive Top 40, but ultimately failed. It’d be enough to send most bands scurrying back to the labour exchange in search of a new career.

But 19 years later the band are not only together, on stage and announcing the imminent arrival of their sixth album, but are playing to a heaving full house. And these people don’t just like David Devant & His Spirit Wife, they truly love them. They bellow out every word of their songs, enter into audience participation with gusto and queue afterwards for selfies.

Quite why they inspire this level of fevered devotion takes a while for the previously uninitiated, like this reviewer, to fathom out. What transpires is that while they’re best known for their onstage theatrics and generally not taking themselves too seriously, something else is going on beneath the sheen of irony.

So while singer/guitarist Mikey Georgeson (or The Vessel to use his official nickname) still dons an impressive wig and mascara and uses knowingly Bowie-esque tones, the sheer infectiousness of the songwriting and the hidden depths of their lyrics sparkle much more brightly. The energetic bounce of Ginger, for instance, works on several levels. Georgeson says he wrote it about a former redhead girlfriend, but as ‘ginger’ is also old fashioned slang for being gay, its wish for a future world where, “we’ll all be ginger and free”, seems more like a wider plea for tolerance and acceptance of otherness.

It’s a similar case with I’m Not Even Going To Try, which they play as their final encore tonight, Georgeson laughing that the audience deserves a royalty payment of their own for the extensive alternative lyrics which they chant back to his lines. “Don’t ask me what I’m doing,“ he sings, “there’s no career that I’m pursuing”, sticking two fingers up to rampant aspiration. “Who says you’ve got to work until you die?”, he asks, gaining possibly the biggest cheer of the night with a defiance that’s worthy of Morrissey at his acerbic best.

With a new album titled Sublime in the pipeline for 2017, David Devant & His Spirit Wife are clearly enjoying every bit of their afterlife.

Rejuvenation and reinvention are also the order of the day for tonight’s notable support act Micko Westmoreland & The Mellotronics. Westmoreland also has several former lives under his belt, one as Jack Fairey in cult glam rock flick Velvet Goldmine, and another as sampladelic electronica wizard The Bowling Green.

This, however, is his first ever live show in his latest guise, showcasing a handful of tracks from solo outing Yours etc abc. Whereas the album itself features sumptuous backing from members of legendary bands like Madness, The Blockheads and The Clash, the Mellotronics go for a sleek, stripped back sound with plenty of jagged post-punk spikiness. The likes of Freaksville, Casting Couch and What Do You Bring To The Party? – with Micko quipping afterwards that it was usually, “a family size pack of Monster Munch” – combine the prodding energy of classic-era Jam with the more mysterious intensity of Magazine or Public Image Ltd.. It all clearly bodes well for the future.

All in all then, a night which may run very much against the grain of accepted music biz coolness, but that’s all the more enjoyable as a result. Spirited stuff all round.

(Ben Willmott)