The Hussy's / Ryna

Well here’s a first. All billings have Glasgow’s The Hussy’s headlining tonight - and given that Ryna are a Manchester band one must presume that is the case - but they are up first, which if they are any good might leave the local ‘support’ in an unenviable position of trying to follow the Lord Mayor’s show.

Maybe The Hussy’s (by the way, that apostrophe is exactly how they named themselves grammar pedants, it bugs me too!) had had wind of ticket sales when bagging the early slot, as 60 is a generous estimate of how many people were in the building when they started with ‘We Expected’ and they probably fancied an early dart.

	"Nice is such a non-descript word, used when you’ve nothing bad to say but no superlatives either."

The first thing that strikes you is lead singer Fili. With her blonder than blonde hair and shocking pink combined with black clothing combining with alluring looks she claims all the attention, despite the guitarists best efforts by growing a moustache that would put Brandon Flowers to shame. It is, I am ashamed to say, enough to make you ignore the songs for a spell and is certainly something to remember them by.

In that respect the band’s founder member James McColl is not daft. McColl was formerly lead singer and songwriter with The Supernaturals, a band who scratched the surface of the top 40 in the late 90’s with optimistic and jolly tunes like ‘Smile’ and ‘Lazy Lover’. Had he taken on singing duties here, The Hussy’s would just have ended up as Mark II of that former life, and he is brave enough to become the background in his new venture. However, he does manage to pilfer a lot of backing vocals, which I suppose is his right.



Like in his previous guise, McColl and co have penned a bunch of inoffensive and, well, nice tunes. It rather damns them with faint praise though. ‘Nice’ is such a non-descript word, used when you’ve nothing bad to say but no superlatives either. Each of the songs can get the foot tapping, they all have some decent instrument work on them (with the piano playing shining above the rest), but it’s nothing remarkable. What engages you is trying to place where you’ve heard Fili’s voice before.

And then it twigs. Her words are so carefully and clearly pronounced, and as such in defiance of her between-song Glasgow burr, that they could be heard in Oliver singing ‘Consider Yourself’. Your photographer had the same thought by the way, although she went for ‘Tomorrow’ from Annie!

New single ‘Tiger’s one note piano riff plonks along pleasantly enough like ‘Lovecats’ merging with a ‘Dreaming of You’ chorus, whilst the best tune is ‘Please Don’t Call Me at Home’ a cheerful lament on living with your parents. The song blatantly steals the synth intro to the chorus of 80’s classic ‘Mickey’ and is all the more fun for having to work out where it came from.



Ultimately ‘nice’ is the best you can say about The Hussey’s though. There’s little wrong with what they’ve done and you wouldn’t leave if they were playing. But you’re unlikely to go out of your way to see them either, although with some decent marketing they could well have a Supernatural-like chart success.

All in all, that meant Ryna could wow the Roadhouse if they had it in them. Alas, they didn’t. Lead singer Caroline Sterling’s look didn’t help - it’s striking for sure, but we’ve seen blonder than blonde hair and shocking pink combined with dark clothing already tonight – but the real problem is that she appears as though she just can’t be bothered.



Her band mates give it everything with a low slung bass, exaggerated strumming and drums bashed into submission, but this is not what we are supposed to look at, they are all in the dark and the lights point at Sterling. Unfortunately she is half heartedly throwing a weak arm into the air, dancing unconvincingly, deserting the stage to retrieve a forgotten tambourine and forgetting her words to the songs.

Those songs aren't much to write home about either. Frequently you think that they are doing this 'in the round' like we did with 'London's Burning' at school, as the voice bears no relation to the instruments. It is also terribly flat during most of the songs. It transpires that the only crowd enthusiasm comes from Sterling's house-mate, and he should be admired for his loyalty as cheering her lazy performance is really a test of a friendship.

FUTURE GIGS

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