Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

It doesn’t quite matter when, for timing is unimportant in such matters, but at some point when watching Scare Tactics inside the 02 Academy as they support America’s Metal sensation Kobra and the Lotus, you will feel the floor buzz as if you have somehow placed your feet on a carpet of the biggest, meanest and understandably angry bees going. The buzz turns to a loud hum and in time becomes the type of noise in which images of 747 jet plane, perhaps being piloted by the largest bee ever seen and who woke up with a hangover the size of The Empire State Building, comes across in waves. It is palpable, it is magnificent and the beat is relentless.

The four members of the group, And’A Barker, Paul Charnock, Danny Williams, Stuart Barker dig deep as the September sun finally disappears over the Mersey and the darkness outside encloses in on the Academy. Like a stealthy adversary, ghoulish, spectral and full of malevolence, September’s darkening days claw at the spirit and cause worry of another year coming to a close. The bells toll as the thought of winter grips the heart and yet Scare Tactics stand in Winter’s way, panic is averted as the buzz underneath your feet is recognised for what it is, the heartbeat of your soul asking to be cared for and as the band play on, the more care you feel.

Sandwiched between the young but brutally excellent Black Diamond and the headline act may have driven other’s to despair but the chain saw like quality, the sound of a guitar being played as if it was holy water being poured over a sizzling demon and with great enjoyment of both sides of the stage divide, anxiety was kicked into the long grass, its backside sore from the beating administered and the songs allowed to reign supreme.

If music be the food of love then in the hands of Scare Tactics, love was a blessing, a relief from the terror of life and songs such as Remain, We Live, the brilliant, as yet untitled track and Little Time shrouded the audience away from the grip of any September unease felt as the dark nights creep a little closer each day.

Scare tactics are used by those that wish to undermine and subvert the so called normality of life, Scare Tactics stand in their way and add their own cultivated assurance with their steaming presence, it is to be welcomed and to be encouraged. From the crowd inside the Academy the encouragement was loud and clear, ringing endorsements that match the intensity of a band’s drum beat surely should never go unnoticed.

Ian D. Hall