The Answering Machine, The Harley, Sheffield

In a day and age where tickets for gigs go on sale months in advance of the actual event, it is not often that we find out that the band behind one of the year’s best albums are playing our local pub/venue only days before it actually happens. Quickly ensuring that we have no prior plans for said evening, we make sure that we were in attendance. And what a good job we are.

Taking to The Harley’s small stage somewhat timidly, despite (or perhaps because of) the sadly lacking crowd, The Answering Machine straight away offer up one of the indisputable highlights from ‘Another City, Another Sorry’; ‘Lightbulbs’, with it’s chorus of “her eyes just popped like lightbulbs / and I know we can turn this / we can turn this round”, gets a great big smile on our face right from the offset.

Throughout the set, that grin we’ve got on fails to drop once, staying put through songs that to these ears sound like stone cold classics. There’s the giddy pop of ‘Oklahoma’, the Franz Ferdinand-isms of ‘Oh, Christina’ and the thunderous ‘Cliffer’, all of which have us singing along and we’re sure, looking like a fool. Although most of the material in tonight’s all-too-brief set is culled from the aforementioned record there’s also a spattering of new material mixed in, including one that singer/guitarist Martin has us believe is getting it’s premier in front of this very audience. These new tracks have a slightly more subtle feel than those with which we are familiar, and bode well for The Answering Machine’s future. Still, it’s ‘Emergency’ which really steals the show tonight. There’s one false start, due to the backing (glockenspiel) track being forgotten but all is soon on track and the soaring chorus makes us forget that we’re in a little pub and have a freezing cold walk back home ahead of us.

It should be mentioned, that despite their initial timidity The Answering Machine look at home on stage tonight. They’ve come a long way since being backed by drum machine Mustafa Beat and look like everything a band should be. All three members along the front (Martin is flanked by Pat (guitar) and Gemma (bass)) providing vocals when needed and Ben’s drums providing an ace backbone to the whole thing. It’s impossible to put a finger exactly on what it is that makes The Answering Machine so special but it’s there in spades. They may have called their music “stale” in a Freudian slip tonight but be assured, it’s not. The only regrettable factor in tonight’s show is that we can’t take the band up on their offer of a free chat afterwards.