We were invited down to Òran Mór in West end of Glasgow on 2nd of November to witness the 3-piece band from Edinburgh, High Fade. The celestial band of three are made up of vocalist and guitarist, Harry Valentino, bassist Oliver Sentance and Calvin Davidson on the drums and vocalist. I discovered this band through a friend a couple months back and have been listening to them repeatedly (cheers Evan!).
We squeezed our way through the packed-outSaturday crowd to make sure we got a good enough space for the night ahead. At 8:30, they had graced the stage and right off the bat they would infect the room with their infectious groovy sound. The vocalist/guitarist would warm up the crowd with a couple of “How are we feeling are we feeling good?” phrases before bursting into their funky first song. While the first tune was playing, the crowd was grooving along with it. Quite early in the set, Harry would be so into his tune, that he would break his guitar string. The impressive part of the whole thing was that he continued to finish the song and still sounded perfect. After the tune ended, he would change his broken string on stage in the space of a minute, also impressive.
They would play songs from their discography such as “Scorpion” and “Fur Coat”, and from their new album like “Take Me To The Floor” and “Bone to Pick”. The crowd was absolutely loving it and I appreciated the crowd participation in the song “Bone to Pick”, when it came to the chorus, we were instructed to wave our arms in the air at the same time and there would only be a sea of bouncing arms feeling the groove.
The band presented themselves well looking like true entertainers. The vocalist would showcase his James Brown-esque screams that never got old. It was refreshing to see the bassist making full use of the stage as some bands the bassist would stand in the same spot and hardly move, but you could not stop the fella from grooving. The band had great chemistry between each other, and you can tell they really enjoy being in each other’s company. The band all have amazing musical talent, from effortless funkadelic guitar strumming to thunderous basslines, and even an 8-minute (I think) drum solo which was just wild, it’s no doubt this band destined for great things.
I loved the use of lighting in the room and would change to purples and reds for a funkier up-tempo song, to blues which were used for a guitar solo of Harry’s when it slowed down for a bit. And of course, the use of strobe lighting was perfect when they would play their unreleased track “Life’s Too Fast”, it really got the crowd moving, so much so that a mosh pit formed at the front of the room! The night ended with their highly stimulated “Burnt Toast & Coffee” and a blissful and polite rendition of Limp Bizkit’s “Break Stuff” (without the blissful and polite part).
I respect this band as they do everything themselves, perform, travel via their own van, set up gear andwork the merch stand after a stunning performance and meet and talk to their fans. I was sure to buy a t-shirt from them to remember the night, not that I will forget it in a hurry anyway.
This band is a must see if you like good music and will be performing in Scotland with them playing 3 dates in Edinburgh (2 of which are sold out) 15-17th January, and in Glasgow at The Classic Grand on 18th January where they will be performing their new album ‘Life’s Too Fast’ which will be available 20th November.