LIVE REVIEW: The Marigolds @ Outpost, Liverpool

Where have all the goths in Liverpool gone? The punks, the queer kids, the ones that used to hang out by the courts, or around the museum? They’re here, in Outpost, a sticky backroom thick with gig posters and synth, seeing the very best of Liverpool’s local bands. 

The first wave of fabric draped gig goers are here to see The Nocturnal, a gothic swirl of Siouxsie vocals and Cure covers. They’re volatile, with safety pins stringing together their lines of synth and shimmering guitar, all swaddled in a tangled lyricism. Girls dance at the front, skipping between their moonlit basslines and jagged drum beats, trance like in their state. 

Humongous Fungus

They hang around for Humongous Fungus, a Manchester based punk trio who seem constantly surprised that they’re playing to more than three people. In reality, it’s hard to distinguish the band from the sea of flannels and band t-shirts that have descended upon Outpost as the sun has set. They are proper, late 80s grunge band, with a psychedelic vibrancy that lightens the muddy guitar and claustrophobic drums. Sticky with beer and sweat, their set ends with a declaration of love to the audience, and a plea not to forget their name, unlikely with one as brilliant as Humongous Fungus. 

Apart from the excess of band t-shirts, there are other indications that this is a properly DIY show. One of these is that the evening is pushed back for a poetry reading, mostly about the moon “I stopped writing about it once I got medicated”, our poet admits. 

Sisters

After this brief interlude, Sisters crawl onto the stage, emerging like a contortion act to center stage. Each movement is done painfully slowly, a seductive guitar line is warped around a frantic vocal which taunts the thrashing drum beats. It is almost difficult to watch; their lead singer is forever on the verge of falling from whatever sound system she’s balanced on, her pining vocals almost tangling amongst the eerie guitar. And yet, each song emerges more glorious than the last, a perfectly executed circus act, practised to a disturbing perfection. 

If Sisters are a circus act, then The Marigolds are their pyrotechnics team, an utterly unhinged eruption of a band. They’re massive, with huge glam-rock intros and tunes that are mostly chorus, a ramshackle collection of pummeled guitars and flaring basslines. Their tunes ping around the room like a child who’s just discovered dancing; a wildly erratic, indefatigable force.

The Marigolds

They have years of music to draw on, from early 2020 releases to their latest single, Friends, a psychedelic punk anthem dedicated, probably, to over half of Liverpool’s music scene. It’s a mix of sludgy older brother music, Deaftones and Nirvana, and bounding tambourines, and is just simply fun. 

“This is for the gays and the theys”, they announce before their final song: tonight is a completely safe space, far from the cold of the museum steps or the eyes of passers by. So when wondering where the goths have gone, the queer kids and the punks, maybe look at Liverpool’s DIY shows, they’re probably hanging out there.