| venue / date | source |  date |
| London Astoria - 6 december 1990 | melody maker | 20 october 1990 |
BIN TO BE WILD
NED'S ATOMIC DUSTBIN
ASTORIA, LONDON
NED'S Atomic Dustbin are a curious phenomenon. Their adoring hordes
of fans are as young and silly as themselves, but rather than showering
the band with glowing praise, they show their appreciation by shouting
"You're shit" and throwing cans at the floppy-fringed singer.
Jonn doesn't seem to mind, though, he just laughs and plots his revenge.
This comes during "Aim", for just as the stage-divers prepare
for take off, Jonn stops the song to give them his rendition of "Ice
Ice Baby". Naturally this brings hurls of abuse until they resume
the required raucous
racket. It's full of distorted power and minamilist chord changes. And
like all the Ned's noisiest numbers, the two bassists, Mat and Alex,
excel themselves. They create a huge thudding wallop, so bellowing it
seeps through your feet and shakes the marrow in your bones.
As the temperature rises, this grotesque low rumble grows in stature
and threatens to drown out every other instrument on stage. Luckily
it doesn't hamper the dark and dirty "Flexible Head". The
repetitive chords and nasal northern whining makes it sound uncannily
like The Wedding Present. But what will always distinguish the Neds
from their Yorkshire counterparts is their gormless gumby dancing. You
would have to DC seriously uncoordinated to copy it.
Unfortunately, these awkward aerobics have a destabilising effect on
the band and just as they try to gather momentum, widening cracks start
to shake their foundations. The guitarist speeds off at 100 mph leaving
the poor bassists floundering and Jonn completely clueless. The show
threatens to turn into a farce until they break into the colossal "Kill
Your Television". A more brazen, snotty song would be hard to find.
It swings like a pendulum between being excitingly dashing amd childishly
naive.
As usual, Ned's Atomic Dustbin's wayward cacophany is riddled with attractive
flaws tonight. Their disregard for timing and singing in tune gives
them a spontaneous, unrehearsed fell. Jesus, if they ever get in the
Top 10 it would prove that anybody could do it. And that's why these
incredibly silly boys are so utterly lovable.
ZANE