Spacehog, the British glam band with the New York sound, played a blaring, loud show at Summerfest Sunday night, and to put it simply, they rocked. They rocked hard.
In their third show in five years at Summerfest, Spacehog hit the road to promote their new album, "The Hogyssey." As tight as ever, the four guys from Leeds played most of the CD, only two tracks from the sophomore effort, "The Chinese Album" and a bunch of tunes from their debut album, "Resident Alien."
Consummate performers, bassist and front man Royston Langdon also played a handful of tracks on the synthesizer. His brother, guitarist Antony Langdon, sang lead on several songs, a departure from past Milwaukee shows.
As the concert was broadcast live on Lazer 103, Anthony made sure to drop the "F bomb" enough times to raise the ire of any potential FCC censors. But as always, Spacehog played the part of rock stars, and Royston interrupted the show to sing "Happy Birthday" to his supermodel finance, Liv Tyler.
The decent sized but chilly crowd didn't seem to know all the songs, but they cheered the group on to an encore that included "Beautiful Girl" and a raucous jam of an unreleased tune. The audience did know, and sang along to Spacehog's two hits, "In the Meantime" and "Mungo City."
Far from prolific, Spacehog has only released three albums in the last seven years, and "The Hogyssey" has drawn tepid reviews. In fact, they don't tour often, either. But once again, Spacehog proved to Milwaukee that it takes every concert seriously, free or otherwise. Their 75-minute live performance Sunday showed there's still a lot of life in this slightly old-school but completely unique band.
Andy is the president, publisher and founder of OnMilwaukee. He returned to Milwaukee in 1996 after living on the East Coast for nine years, where he wrote for The Dallas Morning News Washington Bureau and worked in the White House Office of Communications. He was also Associate Editor of The GW Hatchet, his college newspaper at The George Washington University.
Before launching OnMilwaukee.com in 1998 at age 23, he worked in public relations for two Milwaukee firms, most of the time daydreaming about starting his own publication.
Hobbies include running when he finds the time, fixing the rust on his '75 MGB, mowing the lawn at his cottage in the Northwoods, and making an annual pilgrimage to Phoenix for Brewers Spring Training.
