(Still) Clutching at straws...

I saw half a Fish gig last night. I won a pair of tickets in a competition on Planet Rock, but I had a prior engagement earlier in the evening so had to go late. Fish was due to be on stage at 9pm but it was nearly 10pm when (my colleague) Pedro and I made it to the Jamhouse in Edinburgh for the gig.

This was the first gig in the '13th Star' tour, the new album of that name went on sale for the first time at the gig last night (I bought it, review to follow). This tour also marks the 20th anniversary of the Clutching at Straws album. So I was expecting a mix of tracks from these two albums, with maybe a few other classics thrown in for good measure.

I don't yet know what songs we missed in the first hour of the show, but the remainder of the set was (with the exception of one song) from the Clutching at Straws album. This is not a complaint. Indeed, it is far from a complaint, it was a great (half) gig!

The setlist in the second half of the gig was (from memory, so song order may be a bit muddled):

1. Warm wet circles
2. That time of the night (the short straw)
3. Vigil
4. Sugar mice
5. White Russian
6. The last straw
   Encore:
7. Incommunicado

The sound in the venue was not great (not terrible either) - everything was a bit bassy, muffled, too loud and the vocals were too far down in the mix, but the band were on form and Fish was having a ball. There was more than usual in-between-songs banter and the whole atmosphere was more party-like than usual.

The crowd was a mixed bunch. Clearly there were a lot of Fish fans there but, given that many of the tickets were won online rather than bought, there were quite a lot of non-fans too. I suspect that there were quite a lot of Planet Rock folk and media people there too. This gave the atmosphere a peculiar vibe. The audience was half-halfhearted, if you know what I mean.

But a good start to the tour. Fish promised to return to Edinburgh next year, so I'll probably go again then.

More photos (not mine) from the gig can be found here...

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Update: the full setlist for the gig was:

1. Slainte Mhath
2. Circle Line
3. So Fellini
4. Square Go
5. Perception of Johnny Punter
6. Manchmal
7. Hotel Hobbies
8. Warm wet circles
9. That time of the night (the short straw)
10. Vigil
11. White Russian
12. Sugar mice
13. The last straw
    Encore:
14. Incommunicado

Fish had also intended to play Dark Star and Cliche, but dropped them due to time constraints.

Impressive that, of the songs from the new album, he managed to pick my three least favourites to play... Just as well I missed the first half ;o)