Gun, Barrowland, Glasgow
Jonathan Geddes
Four stars
Black Friday, and while Christmas parties were taking place up and down the land, here were Gun with a suitably Yuletide show. It even worked in a few features that seem to occur at every bash – someone took ill, there was an unsteady attempt at covering a pop song, and the night ended with a sing-a-long to Merry Xmas Everybody.
The first of those points carried the most importance. Dante Gizzi, once Gun’s bassist but now their swaggering singer, mentioned he was sick and had needed a strong prescription just for the gig to go ahead. At times, it showed, with a voice that was more of a rasp than normal and a stage manner that was a little subdued, especially early on.
Yet Gun are a hardy bunch. They have weathered the reunion blues better than most, and a steady diet of unreconstructed rock was served up, barrelling along at a fair old rate. This year’s Frantic album provided a few poppier moments, with the sleek title track and the sashaying One Wrong Turn carrying some character.
The old favourites, meanwhile, aimed for the gut and mostly delivered, from an early double-header of Don’t Say It’s Over and Better Days that went straight for the anthemic punch and connected to a closing raucous run highlighted by towering versions of Inside Out and Word Up, songs that motored along on audience interaction. Such gleeful spirits meant the gig survived a few lulls, notably a take on Every1’s A Winner that never got going.
The remainder, however, offered up no frills classic rock played in punchy fashion, right down to that closing Slade cover. Festive fun all the way.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here