Jeanie AND The White Boys & The Gash play the Old Blue Last: Gig Review
The night I arrived in London, on the 15th of August, I was invited to a gig by a fellow American friend. At The Old Blue Last pub in Shoreditch. The gig was quite mysterious but had enough rumors circulating about it to provide me with context. All I knew going into it was that Nick Cave’s son was in the headlining band called The Gash. I was interested in hearing their music, as they don’t have anything released online so I couldn’t know what to expect; Also hearing that their music was considered ‘desert rock’ I was imagining something along the lines of The Brian Jonestown Massacre. Someone should have told me to lower my expectations.
The opening band was amusingly called Jeanie and The White Boys. I hadn’t heard of them, but I was quickly enchanted by their performance. Jeanie’s character is quite intense and impossible to ignore, making her magnetizing on stage. When talking about the set with someone I met at a bar the next night, I expressed my admiration for her and the character she creates through her music. The London local that I brought this up to assured me that it was no character. She talks openly about her sex life, her frustrations dealing with men– especially white men– and classism, and she does it all with long, platinum blonde hair, sport shorts, and a crop top.
The general consensus of people more familiar with these bands was that they didn’t understand why Jeanie and The White Boys and The Gash were performing together, as they’re very different groups. One speaks out against privileged white men while the other is a perfect example of just that. The only thing I would say that they have in common is the aggression that goes into their music, as both are clearly punk inspired. However, Jeanie and The White Boys are describing something much more specific with their music. Their frustration is aimed at something, a certain type of person, which seemed to be upper class people who look down on the working class, given her explanation for their last song of the night, Boohoo Girls. The song, she explained, was based on a woman who was hooking up with the same rich white man as her, and when the woman found out that he was seeing Jeanie, she described her as someone who would shop at BooHoo, a notoriously cheap party clothing store. The only notion of a meaning that the crowd received for a song from The Gash was an incoherent and short statement that had something to do with “when your girlfriend is seventeen and you want to pick her up from school but you’re her teacher”?
As it turns out, I witnessed a relatively tame show when it comes to The Gash. A friend of mine said he saw both Jeanie and The White Boys and The Gash play another gig together a few months before in which the lead singer of The Gash allegedly beat up an audience member mid-show. As for the name ‘The Gash’, it sounds decently original until you see that the logo is a direct rip off from The Clash. Discovering this after the gig, I genuinely wondered if the whole thing was just some crude joke.
Side by side comparison of The Gash & The Clash logos
Anyway, it was clear what was going on with The Gash, and it’s a story that anyone that has anything to do with live music knows all too well; what happens when some privileged kids do too many drugs and just fuck around on stage. That being said, there are bands that can successfully pull off that vibe and do well for themselves; but to me the Gash didn’t stand out enough. Although I had to leave early, I can’t say the night was a complete miss, as I genuinely enjoyed Jeanie and The White Boys and would love to see where they go next.
As someone who was completely new to the London underground music scene, you can trust that my opinion is completely unbiased. I may not know all the lore of the bands that I went to go see, but I’d like to think that I know a good band when I see one, and I think Jeanie and The White Boys definitely had something special. In the end, I'm glad I was able to see two very different sides of the London scene all in one gig.