Review by Gary Spiller for MPM
“The pleasure is to play
Makes no difference what you say
I don’t share your greed
The only card I need is the ace of spades”
Motörhead – ‘Ace of Spades’
The third deepest natural harbour, after Rio and Sydney, I’m proud to call Falmouth my hometown. This one-time home of the Packet Ships, the first major harbour along the Western approaches of the English Channel, was where, in 1805, the news of Nelson’s death at Trafalgar first made landfall. This evening in the first of a two-part Welsh ‘invasion’ of the Westcountry we return home, for the first time in nearly seven years, in search of alignment.
Just a couple of weeks after an incredible seven planets aligned in our night skies so things, this time of a musical nature, are doing the same here in West Cornwall. It will be fully a decade this summer since Motörhead played just up the road, north of St. Austell, at the renown Eden Sessions. A visibly frail Lemmy and his trusty metalliferous lieutenants Mikkey Dee and Phil Campbell took to the Eden Project stage for what would prove to be the band’s last ever UK show in the scenic setting of a former china clay quarry.
That summery evening in the heart of ‘Clay Country’ a quartet of local lads, King Creature, opened up the evening in typically bristling fashion. In a delicious slice of symmetry, this evening with a resurgent King Creature in tow, Phil Campbell returns to Cornwall for the last of a whirlwind three-date mini Westcountry tour. You see we like to get our metaphorical ducks in a nice linear formation, like this, if at all possible.
Opened in 1911 the Princess Pavillion, located adjacent to the seafront Gyllyndune Gardens, continues to thrive as an entertainment venue following thanks to the town’s local council takeover in 2021. With the collapse of Cornwall Council’s leisure provider, the year prior, it’s future, at the heart of Falmouth’s community, appeared to be under serious threat. Mercifully, this gem of a venue, which has played host to the likes of Saxon, The Saw Doctors and Joe Bonamassa through the years, has survived.
With the howling of sirens, a recently invigorated King Creature assemble; no roar of twin-V engines unlike their own headline date here back in 2018, purely a streamlined, determined sense of purpose. Opening track, and latest single, ‘Lost in the Riddle’ pounds the interior with its uncompromising riffage as the Pavillion continues to fill.
Guitarists Matt Karl Vincent and Mike Stenning trade licks either side of frontman, and bassist, Dave Kellaway who’s dealing a tasty low-end coupled with a fearsome percussive from Jack Sutton-Bassett. Something is reassuringly familiar and equally comforting as make no bones about it the Creature is back. However, following a number of years of a self-induced post-covid hiatus it’s immediately striking that they’re leaner, keener, and more well-honed than before.
A fine slab of Kernowshire metal ‘Desolation’, the signature track of ‘Set The World On Fire’, is followed up by album companion ‘Falling Down Again’ whose tempestuous rage and infectious maelstrom casts a charismatic spell. It’s great to see the bands former manager Jules ‘The General’ Chenoweth take to the stage to share the vocal duties with Kellaway. The Creature is most certainly back where it belongs.
There’s little requirement for introductions but Kellaway’s “We’re King Creature and we’re from fucking Cornwall!” is greeted with a deafening cheer from a rowdy local contingent who are acquiescently lapping up every moment. The old and the new are paired up to power through the second half of the set. The darkened vibe of ‘Rise of the King’ and the metallic gallop of ‘The Sniper’ being interspersed with a couple of longtime live favourites ‘Lowlife’ and ‘Power’.
For 40 or so minutes the Cornish metalliferous quartet have served evidence that they’re far, far from done. With a re-energised core, the serious business has resumed leaving an expectation of further new material delivered with a laser-beam focus. We’ve been taken in hand and tumbled gloriously along obsidian corridors chasing the shadows from themselves. With a firm foot upon a bottomed-out accelerator a good-sized crowd has been whipped right up into an effervescing ferment.
Betwixt bands the alignments continue as I bump into good friend, and guitarist of lofty repute, Graham Bath who happily relates of his time in Persian Risk. A period that overlapped with the latter stages of a certain Phil Campbell and a memorable night at the fabled Cornwall Coliseum when Risk opened up for none other than Motörhead. Not too long afterwards Campbell got ‘the call’ from Lemmy and the rest, as is oft stated, is history.
Continuing the reminiscing ‘Bathy’ recollects Persian Risk supporting Motörhead on The No Remorse tour a few months after Campbell had joined forces with Lemmy. For nearly 32 years Campbell remained a loyal constant becoming the longest serving member of Motörhead, after Lemmy, in the process. In my eyes there is nothing more befitting than Phil ‘Fucking’ Campbell leading the 50th anniversary salute to Motörhead.
Quo’s party anthem ‘Rockin’ All Over The World’, synonymous with the good time rock n’ roll Lemmy thoroughly advocated, heralds the onstage arrival of Phil Campbell and the Bastard Sons. Calling the crowd back from the bar the 12-bar boogie gets the Pavillion rocking along in double-quick time. Arms outstretched vocalist Joel Peters bounds to the front of the stage “C’mon let’s see you jump!” he encourages.
No holds barred ‘Iron Fist’, 1982’s title track and one of six such titular numbers aired this evening, quakes from the off. Peters, reverentially, points left-handedly in Phil Campbell’s direction to salute the first of many searing solos despatched throughout the set.
Barrelling headlong into the rampaging stampede of ‘Damage Case’ we continue in the 80s before the first switch of decades with the rumbustious rock n’ rolla ‘Going to Brazil’. If there’s ever a track that lines up with Lemmy’s assertion “We were not heavy metal, we were a rock n’ roll band” then this is it. Lifted off the grammy nominated ‘1916’ album its infusion of 60s r n’ r and a good dosage of hard rock gets the entire Pavillion onside. Tight as you like Falmouth is bouncing as Phil wrings out the fiery outro solo with Todd Campbell providing the necessary riffage.
With a trademark vocal growl Peters delivers the instantly recognizable ‘Orgasmatron’. This slithering prowler rapidly ascends, with NASA approval, into planetary orbit, no thrills are required. With a ZZ Top-esque echo things are warming up with Todd’s fretboard afire. Into the current century for ‘Rock Out’ with Tyla Campbell’s bass lines a pulsing onslaught.
“Luckily it’s a good tune!” enthuses Phil as he introduces ‘Metropolis’ explaining how Motörhead used to play it every night. Its heavy dark bluesy underpinning reels back the years effortlessly as a hell derived storm is untethered. Pints are raised in appreciation prior to the underworld being lifted in a slick as fuck ‘Born to Raise Hell’. Face-melting to its nucleus paint is stripped across a mile-wide radius, the ante has been upped further.
Kerosene fuelled, the contagious buzzsawing of ‘Smiling Like a Killer ‘ is devilment personified. Naturally dedicated to their touring personnel ‘(We Are) The Road Crew’ shows absolutely no signs of wear and tear. Deeper than Dolcoath – as they say up the road in Camborne – mountains are torn asunder. “If Phil wants a slow song, then we best give him one” notes Peters before becoming the recipient of a double middle finger courtesy Campbell senior prior to the enigmatic blues of ‘Lost Woman Blues’ receives a deliciously meandering treatment.
A particularly blistering ‘R.A.M.O.N.E.S.’ wields the hammer of the gods in deity-appeasing fashion with its muscle car dynamics providing an action packed two minutes as there ever has been in this normally quite tranquil corner of Cornwall. The sleek metallic lines of ‘The Chase Is Better Than The Catch’ ratchets upwards and provides a timely detonation before the main course is dished up.
With middle digits raised as per Peters’ request and a hearty customary “Fuck you Tyla Campbell!” so the utterly unmistakable intro of the anthemic ‘Ace Of Spades’ is despatched in championship winning fashion. It’s still as fresh as the first time I heard it on The Young Ones, one of Phil’s first ever engagements with Motörhead back in 1984. One of four new tracks on revered compilation ‘No Remorse’ the pulverising ‘Killed By Death’ garners the rightful reverence.
Resonant on so many levels a rasping rendition of Bowie’s ‘Heroes’ soars so effortlessly. One of the last tracks recorded by Lemmy and co. it’s a magnificent way to conclude the main body of the set. I wonder, momentarily, if there’s anyone in who saw Bowie play this venue in December 1968 in tonight.
The swampy stomping of ‘Whorehouse Blues’ rattles along carefree atop an undeniable strongarm percussive foundation provided by Dane Campbell, the quiet yet forceful engine room of the outfit. With all five decades of Motörhead duly covered it’s back to the 70s for a triple cannonade to bring the house down and lift the roof simultaneously. Sirens wail to bring in pummelling kinetics of ‘Bomber’ afore signature track ‘Motorhead’ and bone-crunching goodness of ‘Overkill’ take precisely zero prisoners.
It’s smiles all around as Phil punches the air, triumphantly, with a clenched right fist. The quintet circle and circle, all the while whipping up the fervour further and further. Falmouth has been rocked right to its very heart; this is what hard rocking is all about.
Photography by Kelly Spiller for MPM
