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Open Mouth
Studio 3, Bury St Edmunds
Studio 3 is an odd little venue. The sound is nice enough
considering its size, but the layout is rather strange. Sitting left
of the American café-style retro seating is a small stage, while
the large bar behind both is the most overt feature of the whole room.
Even odder is the fact that I'm not even reviewing the main acts of
the night (Cats Against The Bomb, The Resistance), instead lending my
writing to the support act Open Mouth - the solo venture from Miss Black
America vocalist and guitarist Seymour Glass.
Those who admired Miss Black America only for their punk-rock quotient
should meet an Open Mouth gig with some disdain - gone is the teenage
angst, sense of rebellion and zealous rock gusto. Instead, the remnants
of what made Miss Black America special are re-moulded into the framework
of Open Mouth's singer-songwriter acoustic backdrop. Inspired by female
songstresses such as Carina Round and Tori Amos, Open Mouth is more
than just a necessary stopgap while Miss Black America take time out;
in fact, even at this early stage, it's safe to say that the quality
of song writing easily exceeds anything Seymour Glass has done previous
to this.
Open Mouth, lyrically, deals with despondence and depravity - but in
the face of adversity comes out with something honestly beatific. Seymour
has two albums' worth of songs in his repertoire, but being a support
act, he's only able to showcase half-a-dozen. One of the most promising
tracks comes in the form of 'Liberty Belle' - a song which flirts with
its attractive acoustic disposition - while another's a cover of Shocking
Blue's (and later Nirvana's) 'Love Buzz'; utilising a furious vocal
attack and heavy use of the delay pedal, Seymour manages to pull off
a cover far superior to its more-famous arrangements. In a live environment,
the songs fall foul to technical problems, but, of course, every note
is picked back up as if never interrupted.
The acoustic-tinged prowess of Open Mouth will regard Seymour's previous
works with Miss Black America as a subsidiary in terms of song writing.
He may well be a support act at the moment, but if this gig and the
demo sent out is any gauge of the quality of his future output, then
Open Mouth deserves to be big. I would say he's bringing sexy back,
but apparently some bloke called Justin got there before him. I'll just
stick to saying that Seymour Glass is pretty-hot-right-now, musically.
http://www.myspace.com/openmouthmusic
Ben Yates, Drowned in Sound, 23.11.06
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