LIVE(STREAM) REVIEW: Jamie Lenman @ Seperation Event
It’s somewhat ironic that a livestream titled Separation Event premiered the week the world flocked back to the cavernous comforts of their locals, pints in one hand and an Instagram post in the other. Then again, alt-rock cult hero JAMIE LENMAN has always gone against the grain, bucking trends and breaking the mould time after time.
Presented by Audiotree, and inspired by the connection between the concept of leaving your body, and all of the artists and the people watching being separated due to COVID-19, Separation Event is less a livestream concert rather than a modern-day update of VH1’s Storytellers. Closing the chapter on last year’s pandemic-powered King of Clubs mini-album, the performance sees the multi-instrumentalist play the record from start-to-finish.
Separation Event, for all of its attempts to colour outside of the lines of the livestreams we’ve learned to love over the last year, often slips into a disorienting slap-and-dash state. Captured in black-and-white vignettes, cut and pasted between tracks, Jamie jots down his thoughts on the creation of each track to introduce them one-by-one. On one hand, it’s an all-too-rare opportunity to enter the mind of one of British metal’s maddest minds, delving in deep to his psyche and beginning to understand the complexities of his song-writing. On the other, it’s a disorienting dance that threatens far too often to disrupt the suspension of disbelief that’s been so key in seeing live streams become a success during a time where live music is a dirty word.
It’s most noticeable on Sleep Mission, a track designed to play tricks on your mind as it trips you up on it’s metaphorical tripwire. The rhythmic structures of the song collide and clash, making it physically impossible for JAMIE LENMAN to actually play it the way it’s made live. Here, it becomes as disorienting and discomforting as its lyrical obsession with astral projection. If it wasn’t weird enough, you feel like you’re waking up during a recurring nightmare where Will Gardner of BLACK PEAKS is simultaneously screaming at you and playing the saxophone directly into your eardrums.
If Will Gardner playing a saxophone on a song about astral projection wasn’t weird enough, Separation Event and it’s carousel of guests is a dizzying descent into madness. Whether it’s Jen Hingley swapping the noise-pop of FALSE ADVERTISING for the pitter-patter of piano on King Of Clubs to his wife performing hauntingly hypnotic burlesque routines on Like Me Better; Separation Event is the creative culmination of JAMIE LENMAN being locked away for over a year, with no other way of unleashing his Lenmania festival madness on the world.
That’s not to say the collaborations across each and every track aren’t at all beneficial, because a bunch of them breathe life into tracks that were largely lost in the noise of last year’s live music lockdown. WARGASM’s Sam Matlock more than makes up for PENGSHUi’s Illaman being absent on Summer Of Discontent with a performance that punches you in the face with it’s hardcore punk. Sam’s energy is infectious, erupting the stream and sending you off into a live music stratosphere that makes you feel like you’re there screaming your heart out with him. THE ST PIERRE SNAKE INVASION’s Damien delivers a performance on I Don’t Wanna Be Your Friend that once again highlights why his band are underrated in the scene.
Once the dust settles on the King of Clubs showcase, JAMIE LENMAN let’s us slip further into his world of wonder. First up is a compellingly challenging monologue made for a specific audience, and not for those who came for a punk-rock punchup. It’s a move that is bold and brilliant, but also a contributing factor to the disorienting stop-and-start stagnation the performance suffers from throughout.
Ending proceedings is a one-two knockout of previously unheard material made during the pandemic. It’s here in these two tracks that the highlight of Separation Event reveals itself. Collaborating with ITHACA vocalist Djamilia Azzouz, Powerless is a visceral and venomous poison mixed up of DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN, LOATHE and ITHACA themselves. It’s over in seconds, yet stays with you for far longer after the virtual curtains close on this performance.
Separation Event breaks the mould that so many bands have stuck to like flies around faeces. Whilst it doesn’t always work, resulting in a discomforting display of disorienting pace, it’s far too on-brand for one of Britain’s most brilliant minds in alternative music for you to feel anything but utter respect for taking these levels of risk. If anything, JAMIE LENMAN once again highlights just how vital he is to the evolution of British alt-rock, and that’s all that matters.
Rating: 7/10