With Just A Hint Of Mayhem

If you saw my post from 3rd November you will know that this lack of posting is not through general laziness! But the catch-up has begun! On 1st October I was lucky enough to witness the galactic talent that is Delilah Bon live. How good was she? I will tell you, but first I must mention the rather stunning support acts that graced the stage at one of the most compact and delightful venues in Leeds, the Key Club. First up it was Bizarrefae. This was full-on angry techno punk with 100% passion, to quote an old Sex Pistols song, “they mean it, man….”. We all sat down for the sad song too, that was pretty ace. It was a great set and for me “Pesky Pixie” and “Dwarfed” were magnificent highlights. Next, it was the turn of Trunc, arch loud noiseniks coming out of the northwest. Trunc have some mountainously good songs, “Zombies” was my favourite. Trunc do punky storytelling and spot-on protest with oodles of panache. Everyone in the audience was 110% behind the FUCK LIZ TRUSS chant (Oh man does that line age this post!)

Finally, it was time for Delilah Bon, an amazing and passionate artist that I have been following since those early dark days during the Covid lockdowns. Lauren Tate as her alter ego Delilah Bon has proved to be a force to be reckoned with, a force that grows more powerful with every release. But is the world ready for Delilah Bon live? Well, the world has begun to find out if it’s ready for Delilah Bon live, and much of the world is not ready yet, but it fucking needs to be! This show was towards the end of Delilah’s first-ever tour and that came off the back of a few magnificent festival appearances. Delilah is supported by her compadres of hope and passion, Ruena and DJ GOLDENAXE. While Delilah is the focus the show would not be the same without such incredible support. Delilah blurs the lines of genre into a thick fog, there are elements of rap, electro, and punk. But what shines throughout everything is how much she cares for her audience, women, and the LGBTQ+ community. Politicians often have better platforms than this but never use them, Delilah Bon is fearless, compassionate and on evidence to date a fine human being. The set was among the best shows that I have ever seen. This trio of fired-up feminists kicked off at 100 miles per hour and rarely slipped below that pace. “Freak of the Week” and “Chiquitita” were early high points. “War On Women” was full of righteous and justified anger. At that point, Delilah invites women, girls, and LGBTQ+ folks to move to the front and they do. But there were a couple of blokes who chose not to, but the crowd shamed them into moving back. As for the heckler, Delilah didn’t have to say much at all, because the crowd gave him a resounding “Shut The Fuck Up!”. “Chop Dicks” loosened the roof of the Key Club and then “Dead Men Don’t Rape” smashed the roof completely. For me, this track is Delilah’s finest song to date and clearly, the audience seems to agree. Back in 1972, David Bowie began performing as his alter ego Ziggy Stardust, the vibe at early gigs was good but venues and crowds were relatively small. Over just a few months a word-of-mouth avalanche sent Ziggy into the stratosphere. I can picture that happening with Delilah Bon, but given that we now have social media, this will be on a scale that Bowie as Ziggy could only have dreamed of. In years to come, many years from now, if Delilah Bon is not remembered as the voice of a generation I will return and haunt every one of the haters that tried to stop her! I was lucky enough to interview Delilah during her tour, sadly the audio is not great, but I am transcribing it and it will be posted soon!

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