(First posted on http://www.recessiondodgetovictory.wordpress.com on 05/03/2011)
Disclaimer: As with all my music reviews, this is a blow-by-blow account taken from my own perspective and written mostly for myself as a memory aid. I’m not always an expert on the band in question.
After shuffling out of the shed that was Stage 2, and the Melt-Banana experience I didn’t really care to rush to see Dirty Three on Stage 1, so I shambled to the bar for more liquids. As far as I was concerned at the time, they were just three guys playing random acoustic stuff and “grandpa’s guitars!” I couldn’t have misjudged them more.
After queuing for more fluids I promptly met up with the co-conspirator who was chilling at the back of the crowd. He had been at Stage 1 all the while and saw Autolux and Fuck Buttons while I was at Stage 2. Both of his bands both got the big thumbs up with the proviso that Fuck Buttons shouldn’t cause hearing damage when they play. As we caught up, the Dirty Three violinist ‘front man’ chatted to the crowd like they were old friends in the pub – no mean feat considering the language barrier through a translator, whom they dragged through the mud, much to his (her?) faux lament.
My co-conspirator told me that I had only missed one song by Dirty Three since they, like most of the bands all day, had started late. However, as I mentioned above, the Three were no ordinary accoustic set up. Missing one track meant skipping out on a full quarter of their 40 minute set. No one told me these guys are what some consider as the founders of post-rock, if not a massive influence upon it.
And they looked the part too. I hadn’t seen a three-man band hold a sizeable stage before so well. The violinist dived around kicking at climactic moments in the music as the drummer crashed to and fro, reminding me of a jazz drummer I used to see busking around Buchanan Street in Glasgow. The guitarist was the least animated but from the sweeping melodies and echoes coming out of his stacks, he didn’t really need to be.
As I listened to their music I immediately thought of the past and epic windy landscapes of the wild west and its bar-room brawls. Then I thought back again to Glasgow and how the music captured an element of what felt like my home when I went to bars there and local musicians would play. Perhaps it tapped into how eager I am to get home at the end of this month, but for me, this was real Folk music – not those dreary, country 4/4 rhythm sing-a-longs . Where had it been all my life?
I got home and devoured the Internet of Dirty Three. Here’s a taste of why:
Eunuch In A Harem 
[…] You can find all of my gig reviews on my new music blog, Eunuch in a Harem, here: https://eunuchinaharem.wordpress.com/2013/04/24/ill-be-your-mirror-tokyo-2011-dirty-three/ […]
I’ll Be Your Mirror produced one of the best event information booklets I’ve seen in a while for a festival. Here’s what it said about Dirty Three:
Dirty Three are still Warren Ellis, Mick Turner and Jim white. Formed in 1992 in Melbourne, Australia they are still a three piece instrumental group of Violin, Guitar and Drums. Since we recorded Cinder and toured it in 2005 we haven’t managed to record a new album. Well, we are half way through it at the moment. Bands and babies have conspired against us! Jim White has been out and about recording and touring with Bonnie Prince Billy, Bill Callahan and Cat Power and contributing to albums by PJ Harvey and Marianne Faithful, and Mick has been painting, holding exhibitions, reproducing, playing solo shows, and recording soundtracks for film and television, and touring with Will Oldham in Australasia. I have been recording and touring with the Bad Seeds, forming Grinderman, and recording soundtracks for films with Nick Cave, most recently The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford and The Road. Whilst we may not have been in the studio as Dirty Three we have been recording in our other outfits. Frequently, actually, a lot. In 2007 the Australian director Darcey Maine released a thrilling documentary on Dirty Three which maps the formation and development of the group via a series of interviews with people involved in the group and culminates in a live concert in Japan. We have continued to be a presence on the touring circuit, having curated ATP in 2007 at Butlins UK then taking part in the inaugural event in Australia in 2009, we recently performed at the event in New York, playing Ocean Songs in it’s entirety, and then returned to play the UK event twice in December. We recently toured the U.S and I must say, we are in fine form, show-room condition. It’s the first time I’ve actually noticed the benefit of doing all these other projects on the way we play together. We don’t have any news songs, but will gladly play the hits and the ones that got away. On a good day, there’s nothing quite like us on the stage, and you can quote me on that.
Warren Ellis, London