re:mote voices

Headliner: The Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La Band
Venue: Oran Mor, Great Western Road, Glasgow
Date: 9th December 2004

A Thursday night in December, traditionally late night shopping night anyway, and this close to Christmas, one possible explanation as to why the traffic seems to be so overwhelming on the way to Glasgow’s West End. Doors are scheduled for 7pm, and I arrive at 7.30pm having taken longer than expected, though not too concerned –as it turns out, doors have been put back to 8pm, so what should have been an okay time to arrive becomes too early. Leaving half an hour waiting outside Oran Mor, which is placed firmly on the junction between Byers Road and Great Western Road – an imposing old building, formerly the Kelvinside Parish Church, fairly recently converted into a posh restaurant on the ground level, which includes and Alistair Grey painting on the premises, with the concert venue in the basement.

A Silver Mt. Zion are probably most well known for the connection to the Quebec based band Godspeed You Black Emperor!, with which they share members. For some time I managed to miss Godspeed when they played – finding myself in Edinburgh when they played Glasgow, and in Glasgow when they played Edinburgh. However I then caught A Silver Mt Zion in Glasgow, a couple of years a go now, when they played King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut – at the time, I knew who they were, but wasn’t really as familiar with them as I was with Godspeed. The result was that I was impressed, and that is something that has stayed with me, over the course of 3 albums and an EP, regardless of which variation of the name A Silver Mt. Zion they’ve been using. With the result that I would likely describe A Silver Mt. Zion as one of my favourite bands – more so than Godspeed, who when I eventually did catch live I didn’t enjoy as much as I had hoped.

Doors open at 8, more or less, with people still to buy tickets in busy speculation as to whether they are going to get in, with seemingly less than 30 tickets left on the door. Shuffling into Oran Mor for the first time, past the sign that says “the venue” over the front door, past front desk, to the bottle neck of merchandise table and toilet/cloak room area. From there the hall opens up, the bar at the back, the stage at the front, and a decent length between the two, with padded benches and tables along the walls on both sides.

The hall fills up quickly, and no doubt it isn’t long before those final tickets have been sold, and the support band takes to the stage. Called something like “the little leaves” there are two guys on stage with guitars and wan folk music. They make little impression really, although they do hit some lyrical depths/heights with their finale. To some degree you can see how this is the kind of ball park that A Silver Mt. Zion may becoming from, but in real terms there are completely different levels at play.

Time has passed, and it is now about half nine, when The Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La Band announce their presence on stage. From where we are standing we can’t see the entire band/stage – but by our calculation there are definitely 7 members, possibly 8. Microphones have been set up in the centre of the stage with the band in a rough circle around that – cello, guitar, violin on one side, violin, guitar, double bass on the other, with drums in the back corner and the possible someone else kind of in there as well.

The set starts with two new pieces, which have the harder more climactic building rock out that some of the more recent releases have featured and is more familiar from recent Godspeed. These two lead in to an older piece, one of their more melancholic and droningly melodic pieces. This is followed by another new piece, which seems to be an ode to their native Canada to some degree, this is the most rock out, built up piece of the set, hard and rolling. From there, they flash back again to another classic piece, before hitting another new piece. Then another new piece, more reminiscent of their older material, with a balladic core, which they declare to be their last. Of course they leave the stage briefly to a wild crowd response, and quickly return to offer a choral finale. Teasing instruments as they concentrate on weaving repetitive lines together – a song of hope and thanks and praise, summoning up the bands raw emotions as the conflicting vocals work off each other.

In total The Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra & Tra-La-La Band have played something like an hour and a half long set. Somewhat shorter than the time we saw Godspeed, who played for over two hours. But it is funny how it goes, while I found myself growing restless through Godspeed’s set – partly down to heat, and the constant elbowing of the constant stream back and forth to the bar – by comparison I would have been quite happy for A Silver Mt. Zion to have kept going. At least with so much new material in the live set one can assume that there must be another Mt.Zion release in the works for the near future, which is something to look forward to.