Live Review: Electric Boys + The Spangles @ The Waterloo Music Bar, Blackpool on June 5th 2025

Punk rock and funk rock, not the most obvious of bedfellows to be sharing a stage. But The Spangles and Electric Boys have more in common than you might immediately think. Both bands although musically at different ends of the rock spectrum, do things firmly their own way, defiantly and fiercely standing proud against the vagaries of time, fashion and convention. 

First up, The Spangles are a beautifully chaotic assault on the senses, their punky attack a fabulous blitzkrieg of fire and attitude.  There is something genuinely, winningly authentic about the band’s sound that captures the spirit of 76, but welded to a more muscular rock ethic. It’s irreverent and uncompromising fun, that puts a smile on your face, their corkscrewing energy and enthusiasm lighting up the room as they blaze through eleven songs in their set.  From the driving opener ‘I Don’t Wanna Go to Back On the Meds’ and ‘Hold My Hand’ (the latter sounding like Weezer and The Beatles being mugged down an alley on the Kings Road), The Spangles show they are masters of the short sharp shock, each song a barbed wire bullet, a two-finger salute to the boring and the mundane.   

For a trio they sound massive, the decadently cool Polly Phluid’s bass rolling and rumbling, Ace Carlton providing huge fills and ferocious rhythms and Ben Marsden’s buzzsaw guitar driving everything forward.  And whilst Ben may be “just a little bit ill” as he describes it, the performance doesn’t suffer one iota.  They’re evidently having a blast up there, Ben and Polly bantering back and forth in a way that’s always entertaining, involving the crowd and keeping everyone engaged, Polly stepping up to the mic for the riotous POTUS giving Ben a brief break from vocal duties. The fun and energy never lets up for the whole of the set, it’s fast and loose and all the better for it, an adrenaline shot straight to the rock n’ roll heart of us all. 

Electric Boys are a very different proposition; their energy is channelled into an altogether funkier and groovier, although still heavy style.  And to get that groove you need a big bass sound and damn that’s exactly what Andy Christell delivers, laying down the biggest, meatiest licks that threaten to vibrate the appreciative crowd all the way back down Waterloo Road and into the Irish Sea! ‘Groovus Maximus’ exemplifying this perfectly and does exactly what it says on the tin. Only the second song in and the crowd are moving and grooving, but really, it’s impossible not to do so such is the band’s irresistible sound. 

Looking every inch the rockstars, resplendent in hats, scarves, feathers and waistcoats, Electric Boys are both a visual and musical spectacle. Main man Conny Bloom, has a rock n roll Fagin vibe, a devilish, mischievous twinkle in his eye, an effortlessly accomplished and charismatic performer. So, when there’s a technical issue with Martin Thomander’s guitar that could easily have derailed a lesser band, Conny never misses a beat and instigates an impromptu call and response session, inviting the crowd to shout out song suggestions leading to amongst others a quick blast of Ram Jam’s ‘Black Betty’.  It’s unexpected and spontaneous and the definition of turning adversity into triumph, so by the time the set gets back on track with a beautifully bruising ‘Rags to Riches’, if he didn’t already, Conny has the crowd eating out of the palm of his hand. 

‘Mary in the Mystery World’ adds a trippier psychedelic element to the set, complete with some lovely understated soloing, before picking up momentum into a frenetic and fabulous extended solo section of frankly epic proportion.  It’s a tour-de-force of a song in a set already littered with memorable moments, before changing pace again and diving straight into a fast and frenzied ‘Domestic Blitz’.  

Every band has a signature song; one they are destined to play in every show (or risk riotous disapproval) and Electric Boys save theirs for the encore. ‘All Lips and Hips’, the first song many of us heard from the band after reading about them in Kerrang all those decades ago, manages to sound remarkably fresh and contemporary, certainly not a song you would think was not too far away from its fortieth anniversary. 

Electric Boys tonight were really rather regally magnificent, proving that they are still a potent force live and one that doesn’t need to rely solely on nostalgia to be relevant and exciting. For those reliving those halcyon teenage years of listening to “Funk-O-Metal Carpet Ride” on vinyl on repeat, it was obviously a joyful throwback to those far-off younger days, for others it was rediscovery of a band whose timeless and quality back catalogue maybe needs dusting off and re-evaluating, as we’d perhaps forgotten just how great a band they are. And for those who’ve been in it for the long haul since the late eighties, it was a fabulous reward for their loyalty and longevity.   

Whichever camp you fall into, you can guarantee that you left tonight with a bit more groove in your step and funk in your soul, and that can surely only ever be a good thing… 

Check the “In The Flesh” page for more photos!
Electric Boys + The Spangles