A review of Toecutter playing Mad Hatters, Inverness on the 23rd of March, 2012 by Toby Stainton. Photos by McIntosh Photography.
The band has recently expanded ( current line up: Craig Paterson, Andy Nisbet, Tim Latham and Jamie Airey_ , in order to allow Tim to concentrate on vocals, and have clealry seen the benefit of the expansion (for the full interview see Toecutter speaks to invernessGiGs.)
Friday night in Mad Hatters saw Toecutter play their first gig as a foursome, playing first on the bill to SCUM and Lords of Bastard. Toecutter took to the stage in front of a large enthusiastic crowd of sweaty metal-heads, albeit starting later than originally intended due to problems with the PA system. They kicked off with ‘Daedalus’ – with a riff that wouldn’t have sounded out of place on a Therapy? album and immediately got, what can often be a reserved Invernessian audience, moshing in front of the stage.
Second song ‘Trollhammer’ had more of the same, a driving guitar and rhythm section kept the song belting along, although the PA issues didn’t do the vocals justice and at times he was barely audible which caused a few grumbles in the crowd. Tim did his best to work with the poor sound quality and from what I could hear his vocals were very strong. He’s certainly one of the more dynamic singers in the Inverness music scene at the moment, easily switching from death metal growls to ‘proper’ singing without sounding contrived.
The final song ‘Bliss beneath’ saw Jamie sit on the floor whilst continuing to play,Tim explained via Facebook: “I thought Jamie was being incredibly lazy sitting down until I realised his strap broke ha ha ha ha actually I thought him sitting down was most amusing and I’m going to insist on it at every gig”. Toecutter had certainly finished as they had started and the only complaint is that the set was too short!
This was an impressive start for the new line-up with new bassist Jamie Airey looking and sounding like he’s played with them from the beginning.
Further pictures courtesy of McIntosh Photography here.