Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Penny Mob at Studio 2, Liverpool. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.
They have travelled up from London to Liverpool before and gave the audience at District House a taste, a bountiful and very pleasing taste, of just exactly what they can achieve whilst on the stage and in a city which enjoys and respects musicians who give all they have to give from their soul, coming back to enjoy a second bite of the cherry in the form of Penny Mob was just the savoury trimming required.
It is sometimes hard to envy London; admittedly they have produced some great acts, some truly awesome bands that have touched seemingly every person on the planet at some point. You don’t have to look far to understand that without the likes of The Who, The Small Faces, The Kinks and The Theme the last fifty years of music would have been but an afterthought in many ways. Yet in Penny Mob, London has a group that fits in with the ethos of Liverpool, a group who can trade one mighty river for another quite easily and without any loss of musical conscience; for that, to envy London is something to swallow, a group that you could quite happily see in the city more often and one that does not sit on pretension.
Penny Mob took the long journey up the various motorways and by-ways once more again to Liverpool and settled in amongst the indoor heat seekers, the sense of bounty not far from the minds of those who have seen Studio 2 as almost a second home and the unquiet reserve that goes hand in hand with the Thursday night brigade longing for the Saturday to come. In the company of those who take their music seriously, Penny Mob took action and gave the audience a road trip of their own to conjure with, to wind down the windows and let the songs flow into the air.
With a set that included Immortal, 21st Century Kids, Intoxicated, I’m Alive and War On The Street, the drive back to London would have been one that was filled with rightful confidence and optimism; appropriately so, for in Penny Mob there is a band that can command an audience and to whom should certainly be part of the International Pop Overthrow for 2018 in Liverpool.
Ian D. Hall