GIG REVIEW: The Dirt, Dead Stilettos and Supera Morza - Night & Day Cafe, Manchester - Thursday 31 October 2024

Words: Richie Yates, Photos: Adrian Wharton

A trip over to Manchesters famous Night and Day Cafe for a Halloween gig. Its already got a good crowd in when we arrive and this increases as the night goes on.

Supera Morza just blast onto the stage, its a full on Grunge assault with plenty of Nirvana sounds vocally but there’s also a heaviness, like an early Sabbath in full flight and even a touch of Tool going on in there. They keep it up for a full set, conflicting styles merged together seamlessly, simple one minute then complex the next and all delivered with passion by the extremely mobile band. A fine way to open this Halloween evening.

Dead Stilettos have almost calmed down a touch. Resplendent in Halloween Devo costumes, some of their earlier anarchistic approach to live ,music has been replaced by a slightly more considered way of doing things. They sound tighter, the music has changed from out and out punk/stooges assault to a more post punk Wire era. It doesn’t stop them from rampaging all over the stage (and audience space) though and they are still obviously enjoying themselves, as are we.

The Dirt, the main event. A good part of an hour of honest passion and psych guitars welded remorselessly to solid repetitive drum machine beats. Vocalist Jack takes every opportunity to lay their hearts on their sleeves and explain where they come from musically, politically and emotionally and its a straightforward position exposing the whole DIY music scene. There’s tracks from an unrecorded as of yet album thats in the planning stages and these have some extra depth and allow guitarist Sachiko plenty of chance to add extra layers to her already dense cornucopia of sound.