Tonight’s audience are a small but enthusiastic bunch. From those in Misfits t-shirts to hardened, leatherclad punks and hairsprayed punters in tight pants, the motley throng gathered here for metal-punks Sister reflect the musical influences powering the Swedes’ cock rock: an infectious blend of sleaze, gloss and grit that infuses Wembley-sized solos with furious Black Flag-esque riffery.
Vocalist Jamie Anderson has glass-shattering pipes, a face full of horror-punk makeup and a strutting stage presence, and he’s not afraid to get dirty. Some of his banter is a bit hammy but there’s real venom in his voice when he sneers “Fucking pussies” at the well-mannered crowd who refuse to gob on him during Spit On Me. Granted, a cover of GN’R’s My Michelle takes their 80s influences too far and the slower moments – Carry On and Would You Love A Creature – border perilously on cheesy, but otherwise, the glints of Appetite For Destruction-style danger that flash through Carved In Stone and the huge chorus of Unbeliever, or Bullshit & Backstabbing’s lip-curling, knuckledown punk, ensure that Sister’s crosspollinated sound never spills over into mere pastiche.
