GLOK unleash ‘Industry Of Magic And Light’ at Brighton gig

GLOK + WHILE WE WERE SLEEPING – GREEN DOOR STORE, BRIGHTON 26.10.23

GLOK is the electronic alter ego of Andy Bell, he of shoegaze legends Ride, former bass player of Oasis and of course we should not forget Beady Eye & Hurricane #1.

Andy’s last live appearance in Brighton was February 2022 at the most excellent music emporium, Resident Music for an in-store event promoting Andy’s then new solo album ‘Flicker’ where he played a wonderful 45 minute set under his Andy Bell Space Station moniker. The Space Station name has now been retired I believe, but GLOK lives on, and to be fair the concept is similar, synths, beats and backing mixes are orchestrated and played with Andy then playing guitar over the top, taking himself and everyone around him on a highly enjoyable music journey.

And on this evening, whilst Brighton fans gather at the train station for their big European football game, below the station anticipation builds at the ever brilliant Green Door Store venue as GLOK is to play for us, the 14th date on a 16 date UK tour, courtesy of promoters Melting Vinyl. What better venue could there be for such an intimate show.

Throughout the tour GLOK has been accompanied by Innerstrings, a Lewes based visual artist, specialising in music video, liquid light art and live visuals, he has toured with various bands and made several music videos for musicians including Andy Bell/GLOK.

In support, to warm the growing crowd we first have While We Were Sleeping (Guy Schneerson), a local Brighton musical artist, creating beautiful sounds from his brightly coloured and highly complex looking modular electronic set up. Whilst it looked incredibly complex from the crowd’s view, he produced nothing but pulsating exciting rhythms and beats with seemingly ease. Sadly there were no visuals for this, but I could just picture how brilliant they would look. He went down a storm, a perfect preface to GLOKs set.

While We Were Sleeping:
Guy Schneerson – Everything!

GLOK (Andy) arrived on stage looking very relaxed, he welcomed the crowd and got right in to it with ‘Memorial Device’ from the ‘Pattern Recognition’ album, backdropped by a sunset and spinning planet earth Innerstrings visual, it eased the crowd into the start of what would be a fine musical experience.

Seamlessly GLOK moved into ‘Invocation’ (from ‘Pattern Recognition’ album) the beats picked up and the visuals became beautiful red wave lines, almost like an electrical current.

Next we had ‘Tories In Jail’ from the ‘Time At The Vortex’ Gun Aid EP, Andy introduced it with “this next one always gets a good little cheer” and it prompted some whoops from the crowd. A strong pulsating beat ran through this track, the guitar vibe I felt had almost an Arabian feel to it.

Melodic “I am in love” vocals rang out as we entered the next track, Andy wrote this down as ‘German Film Star’ on the setlist, I can’t find this one as having yet been released, so perhaps it is one to come on the next album, it had a mellow start, progressing into a solid drum beat with Andy’s guitar covering it like a warm layer of honey, it really felt like you were been taken on a journey.

“Everyone good?” Andy then said. “I am going to do a singing one now, I decided to bring a bit of singing in on the last album and worked with some great people on it, one of them was Chloe who goes under the name of C.A.R, she wrote the song with me called ‘Entanglement’ and now I am going to try sing it along with her”. C.A.R is Chloe Raunet, her Bandcamp bio reads “a London residing Franco-Canadian formerly of the band Battant, but now a fan of the weirder edges of electronic music”. This song brought the beat tempo down, with Andy’s dreamy guitar and vocals melded with Chloe’s vocal backing track and the much slowed down visuals had us all swaying.

Thanking the crowd again, Andy moved straight into ‘Day Three’ , another taken from the ‘Pattern Recognition’ album. A haunting synth laden song.

We were then treated to a new as of yet unreleased song ‘Industry Of Magic And Light’, this really was a powerful number, mesmerising synths and Andy’s guitar in full effect, it felt like it was from another era, perhaps harking back to those early Pink Floyd days, but at the same time feeling futuristic.

‘Exit Through The Skylight’ another from the ‘Dissident’ album then kicked in with its pumping fast paced beat followed by the calmer ‘Cloud Cover’ also from the ‘Dissident’ album.

Andy then paused to introduce Chris of Innerstrings “If you are tripping now it’s because of him” he quipped prompting much laughter. He also made sure to acknowledge the charity ‘Tonic’ who do great work for mental health within the music industry, asking the crowd to say hi on the way out if they didn’t on the way in. He then thanked everyone for coming announcing “This is the last song tonight, thanks for coming”. We were then treated to ‘Dissident’ from the album of the same name.

There were no need for chants for an encore, as Andy thanked the crowd “You’ve been ace, I can’t leave, shall we do an encore as I can’t get off” he continued, referencing the lack of exit “I make my own little space on the stage and then Chirs takes up everything else” which again prompted much laughter.

Andy then took to the microphone once more to sing a cover version of A.C Marias ‘One Of Our Girls (Has Gone Missing)’, a calming number with subdued backing beats. Andy’s guitar work was the primary focus here, surveying the crowd I could see plenty of heads nodding along in time.

Thanking the crowd once more, the beats ramped up for the final song of the night ‘Dirty Hugs’ taken from the album ‘Dissident’. The visuals behind heavily featuring reds, black and grey with the word GLOK popping up, towards the end of the track, the beats faded down letting Andy rip some more on his guitar, before slowly building up to the finale with Andy once again thanking everyone for coming and inviting them out to the merchandise stall manned by Tonic in 5 seconds.

All in all, what an evening it was, Andy’s stage presence and guitar work is incredibly relaxed, not only do the beats make you want to dance about, the smooth guitar makes you want to close your eyes and sway your head. The Innerstrings visuals marry perfectly making it an incredibly immersive experience.

Andy was kind enough to talk with me afterwards. He is an incredibly humble person, not only did he get me his copy of the setlist, but he corrected it and signed it. First I asked him about the GLOK concept, he said “when he first started with this style of music as The Space Station, it was quite intense, without him talking, just lots of music with beats all over it, keeping it all at the same high level”. The Space Station was more indie focused and improvised, whereas now with GLOK he is making it so it has more ups and downs, ambient sections, “so it doesn’t hit you in the head all the time” he said. Commenting on how relaxed he seems to be, he said that making it relaxed is one of the key things about it and how he intends it to be, he said of the live experience “there are not many guitar parts written into the tunes, so whatever I play is up to me”. sometimes he might play the guitar as the synth parts or other times something new and different, making new effects, Innerstrings are an integral part of the GLOK live experience. He continued that he would one day love to do GLOK sets at Festivals, “a late night thing, perhaps as an after party, in a tent with all of the visuals, it would very much be one of those wind down sessions”, I couldn’t agree more and very much look forward to catching it happen one day, hopefully soon.

GLOK:
Andy Bell – Guitar, Vocals, Mixing Decks
Visuals by Innerstrings

GLOK setlist:
‘Memorial Device’ (from 2021 ‘Pattern Recognition’ album)
‘Invocation’ (from 2021 ‘Pattern Recognition’ album)
‘Tories In Jail’ (from 2021 ‘Time At The Vortex’ Gun Aid EP)
‘German Film Star’ (new – unreleased?)
‘Entanglement’ (from 2021 ‘Pattern Recognition’ album)
‘Day Three’ (from 2021 ‘Pattern Recognition’ album)
‘Industry Of Magic And Light’ (new – unreleased)
‘Exit Through The Skylight’ (from 2019 ‘Dissident’ album)
‘Cloud Cover’ (from 2019 ‘Dissident’ album)
‘Dissident’ (from 2019 ‘Dissident’ album)
(encore)
‘One Of Our Girls (Has Gone Missing)’ (A.C. Marias cover)
‘Dirty Hugs’ (from 2021 ‘Pattern Recognition’ album)

linktr.ee/AndyBellGLOK