Sweden’s Electric Boys must be among the most Anglophile of bands as they constantly seem to be on tour here. They were last in London only last November playing the Camden Club, and I missed that, but have always enjoyed their live shows so on a night with another gig clash, the newly reformed Inglorious had to take second place. The Water Rats is a lovely pub and its back room is one of the more bijou settings on the London scene, but that meant for a cracking intimate atmosphere.

We were warmed up in a different fashion by support act The Spangles, a punky trio with attitude (although old school punks would have blanched at the long hair of two of them). Though not normally within my wheelhouse, no-nonsense songs like ‘One Good Reason’ . and ‘Back On the Meds Again’ brooked no argument, and had quite a few followers rocking out, while there was plenty of foul mouthed but very endearing banter. Indeed after lead singer and guitarist Ben Marsden ripped into a reviewer for their comparisons I made a mental note not to do the same.

That pledge didn’t last long as ‘Hold My Hand’, with a pop sensibility blended in, reminded me of Weezer, followed by ‘POTUS’ with bassist Polly Phluid singing in rather angrier fashion. Other songs to make an impact in a spikily entertaining set were ‘ What We Gonna Do Now’ from Ben’s previous band The Main Grains, the snotty ‘Get Over Yourself’ and ‘Alone’.

The Electric Boys came on stage in rather low-key fashion, main man Conny Bloom as dapper as ever in shades, waistcoat and scarf, and even starting to resemble Bob Dylan, black curls under a straw hat. But they played a series of aces from the start in the openers from each of their original three albums in ‘Psychedelic Eyes’, the swaggering merry go round riff of ‘Groovus Maximus’ and another huge riff in ‘Ready to Believe’, viking looking Slim Martin (Thomander) sharing the guitar duties on that one.

Onto newer songs, ‘Super God’ had an impressive riff though the hooks suffered in comparison with those three openers while ‘I’ve Got A Feelin’ bounced on a very melodic and catchy guitar line from Conny. They began playing the intro to Rush’s ‘Tom Sawyer’ which would have made for an extremely interesting cover version but after a similar snatch of ‘Back in Black’, segued into old favourite ‘Electrified’ with that hypnotically funky riff redolent of seventies Aerosmith.

After a newer song in ‘You Spark My Heart’, Conny asked for requests but after a couple of half-hearted efforts in response, instead the band moved into ‘Rags To Riches’ with those grooves that saw them ride the briefly fashionable funk rock bandwagon that dominated Kerrang! for a couple of years at the turn of nineties in the interregnum between glam and grunge.

‘Mary in the Mystery World’ got a great reception and as well as its psychedelic stylings there was an unexpected lengthy, very Allmans-like jam between Conny and Slim, who seems to contribute more as a co-lead guitarist than his predecessor Franco Santunioni and ‘Domestic Blitz’ (sic) saw your correspondent taken by surprise as Conny went into the crowd playing guitar under his nose. It seemed scarcely credible that we were already onto the last song, ‘Angel In An Armoured Suit’- judging by people around me singing along it’s the best received song from the many albums they have released since reforming in the late 2000s, and was extended with audience participation and a jam.

There were no surprises for the first encore, in ‘All Lips’ n’ Hips’ as people joined in to that signature song that was a guaranteed dance floor filler when I started going to rock clubs. It was followed by an impressive instrumental, but rather disappointingly, after an hour and a quarter, that was it and they headed to the merch stand, leaving me pining for usual set closer ‘Captain Of My Soul’. That aside, it was a thoroughly enjoyable evening, proving Electric Boys are one of the most enduring and underrated bands around.

Review and Photos by Andy Nathan

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