I collect projects that are connected to (former) Eluveitie members like Pokémon. It becomes especially interesting when there’s a hurdy-gurdy involved, so I guess no one is truly surprised to hear that Michalina Malisz’s own band Lyrre is on my list of favourites. This one makes me particularly happy because it’s a band I’ve been following from the very start. Hence I was very excited when they finally announced a show in my area, even if they were only the support act. Here’s my little report about that night, but be warned: Once again I’m focusing on the support act because I went there mainly (or only) to see Lyrre.
The venue
At this point I think I must’ve been to all concert venues Oberhausen has to offer, except for Turbinenhalle 1. Helvete Pub is a metal and rock club with a live stage and when we went to the address to look for the club we were pleased that it was very easy to find (I still have a trauma from finding venues like Helios 37 in Cologne or Kulturclub Schon Schön in Mainz, which were hard to identify). At the entrance we got cards for the bar. It’s a post card-sized card you take to the bar with you and when you buy a drink, they note down the price. Before you leave, you pay the full amount at the cash desk, so you don’t have to pay every drink individually. It’s possible to pay by card and once you’ve paid your card will be devalued. When you leave, you’re asked to give back your card so they can make sure that you’ve paid your bill. The principle works very well and reduces waiting times at the bar.
The club itself is cosy. The concert stage was in the basement and I don’t know if there’s any way for wheelchairs to access the venue, because you have to go down the stairs. In the basement, there’s a club room with a bar, another cashdesk where your tickets will be checked or where you can buy tickets and then you enter the room with the stage. It’s very small and cosy and it doesn’t smell very nice, but it has a cool atmosphere.
The toilets weren’t exactly clean, they smelled a little, there was water on the floor and one of the toilets in the women’s restroom was out of order. BUT there were free hygiene products available and that is a big, big plus.
I don’t think they had food options, but the prices for drinks were absolutely fair (I paid 3€ for 0.4l of coke). I didn’t find a price list beforehand, at least I don’t remember one for non-alcoholic drinks. There were boards with the beer prices on the wall though.
So all in all, I liked the club. The sound was also okay and I can definitely recommend this club.
Lyrre
Now my personal main act. Lyrre started a bit later than it was announced on the club’s website (I think about 15 minutes) and I personally think that’s okay. There were only two acts that night and I prefer the bands starting later than being too early so that you might miss them 😛
First of all, I liked the stage set-up. Lyrre work with tarot card-like artworks for the singles they released out of their album, the album cover itself and you find those artworks a) on their merch shirts and b) they have them lit up on stage. It looked really nice, given that this was a small club with a small stage and just a very simple set-up.
They played a 40 minutes set including one unreleased song, which was a very cool preview. The song was listed on their setlist as „New song“, so there’s not even a name for the song yet as it seems. Other than that, they basically played all songs from their album Not All Who Dream Are Asleep (except that I don’t remember the title track). They opened with an intro, followed by Crown and finished the set with, unsurprisingly, Divide and Conquer. I personally think that the crowd responded well to the songs (and I had the impression that there was actually a big part of the audience who was there to see Lyrre), but I was surprised that there was hardly anyone at the merch table after the show.
Their stage energy was great. Their guitarist Piotr obviously had a fun time, he was hyping up the crowd and jumped over the stage and in the air, singing along and just vibing. Since we stood right in front of him, we occasionally had to duck away when he jumped and kicked into the air and a few times it was a very near miss with either his foot or his guitar almost hitting us. It was great fun to watch.
Their bassist held back a little more and I think the drummer was not the actual drummer of Lyrre. So far I couldn’t find out if there was a change in the line-up or if that drummer was just a replacement for this tour because the original drummer could not take part.
Now give me a moment to praise Michalina. I already loved her back at Eluveitie and I think she’s an incredible hurdy-gurdy player. We stood right in front of her and so I had a very good view at her gurdy-play and honestly, this instrument is just so cool. It was particularly interesting to watch her play with distortion. And the gurdy definitely stood out. Her instrument is super beautiful as well (I think it’s one of their own gurdies, since Michalina and Piotr build and sell hurdy-gurdies in their shop Ancestore). I also loved her vocals, although occasionally they were a bit too silent. All in all it was a very sympathetic performance.
Lyrre’s merch
Yes, there’s an extra paragraph for that because there was cool stuff I need to mention. Of course there was the regular stuff like shirts (we were lucky to buy the last S-sized shirt with the Call in the Wind artwork, yay) and CDs and a signed photo, but Lyrre also sell deluxe editions of their album. There’s either a box with the CD or one with both CD and vinyl. They’re in wooden boxes with an artwork carved into the front and they include guitar picks that, to me, also looked like they were made of wood. How cool is that?
And to top that off: Lyrre sold a hurdy-gurdy at their merch. So if you have spare 1000€ you can buy your own gurdy and start out learning this beautiful instrument 😀 The merch was reasonably priced with shirts being 20€. The deluxe box with the CD was 80€ if I remember correctly and the one including the vinyl was 150€.
The Harp Twins featuring Volfgang Twins
First things first: Already before the show I wasn’t too excited about this act, so I didn’t even expect us to watch them too intensely. It got worse when I got a severe headache during Lyrre’s set, so I prefered to sit down in the club area outside of the concert room. Don’t get me wrong, some harp music is cool. But I wouldn’t need to listen to an entire concert of it, plus I’m not into most of the music they cover. When it comes to metal, they usually play songs of classic / heavy metal bands and you may feel very free to throw sticks and stones at me for not liking Iron Maiden or Metallica or Led Zeppelin or whatever. That’s my father’s music and it never managed to touch my heart. I’m just not a heavy metal person.
We gave it a try, we went inside after we were done at the merch, but it was not just a matter of the kind of music they played that make me dislike their performance. It was the overall way they presented themselves. For me, there was too much talking between the songs, the announcements seemed like … forced humour that didn’t quite match my taste and well … yes, they are identical twins. They look alike. But their partly synchronised movements made me cringe a little. Altogether, it definitely wasn’t my taste.
While we watched, there weren’t any songs they played with the Volfang Twins, so I can’t say anything on that. But when I googled them, I was creeped out by their presentation as well. I’m not a big fan of white Americans overemphasizing their roots in the way they did. Not my taste.
So we decided to leave early. And I’m happy that I’ve seen Lyrre, but for me, the line-up of the evening wasn’t exactly a perfect match.