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pineapplefulfillseveryneed · 2 days

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The Revenge Of Two Hands One Mouth - O2 Academy Bristol (November 27, 2013) by Adam Gasson

After 11 years of not finding a single photo from this show, I found these yesterday! I can not begin to express what this means to me, I nearly cried and I couldn't sleep last night. I was still a rather new fan and this was my first time going to a show in the UK, the first show I went to see with a friend, and my first time meeting that friend, too. And these above photos are SO GOOD! Not much was preserved from this show at all, there was no recording allowed (no charcoal drawings either), and to my knowledge not even the full setlist for this specific show was preserved anywhere. So better late than never, but here's what I remember (with some help from these photos!) and the things I've puzzled back together:

If there was opening music or an opening act, i don't recall, but Russell entered the stage alone. It was dramatic and impactful, and it went quiet as he gave an intense stare into the audience and did a drawn out "ahhh" into the microphone. After a little moment of quiet, it turned out the microphone had been connected to a sequencer which now started repeating "ah ah ah ah ah ah". Suspense, excitement. Russell added: "Hold, hold, hold, hold". (...I was definitely freaking out.) While that started looping on top of the ah ah ah sequence, he made stop signs with his hand as we all listened. A few repeats passed. "I'm getting mixed signals, mixed signals - mixed, mixed, mixed signals".

^ the only seconds of this show I recorded as I didn't yet know it wasn't allowed - security signed at me and I put the camera away. It was fine. (Here's a recording of it made during the US tour later that year - recording seemed to be less frowned upon at that point.)

I don't recall when Ron entered the stage at this show, whether it was during the song or after, but what a way to open! And what an amazing song choice!

The performance that left the biggest impression on me at this show though was Nicotina. It was a choice I didn't see coming, but also the way Russell sang it! Falsetto heaven. (Sadly not a single video is to be found of Nicotina from this tour. But for your falsetto heaven needs, I hope you can find a video of Here In Heaven that they also performed on this tour, because that will also kill you.)

As everyone here probably knows I am quite big on Bergman, which at the time was heavily promoted during the tours, and, the excerpts they played on this tour were different from what they played during Two Hands One Mouth! They played "I Am Ingmar Bergman", The Studio Commissary (my favourite song on Bergman), Limo Driver (but sang by Russell, and HOW!) and "Oh My God". (Here's a video of it from one of the American shows. It's extremely good. People who've been around for a while have seen me lose it over this video many times.)

The most unexpected song choice was probably Katherine Hepburn. Me and my friend had been joking for absolute months that we were going to see Sparks and they'd play Katherine Hepburn (as if that would ever happen, we were obsessed with that song though!). And here we were, and they were playing Katherine Hepburn right in front of our eyes. (What is reality.)

Falling In Love With Myself Again had me losing it over the organ sounds, always a fan of Ron on organ, and I LOVE that song. Russell sang a line in my direction (I died), and he managed to throw another line at me during Those Mysteries ...I died a few times that night. As you might expect. That was kind of the whole THOM/TROTHOM experience anyway. Lots of dying. But the variety of dying where you end up in heaven. (You're at a Sparks show after all.)

They wrote a song especially for this tour, which was not released but only ever played live: Revenge Of Two Hands One Mouth. What a thing to experience! A very dark song, but wonderful. (REVENGE! REVENGE REVENGE!)

At the end of the show Ron took a photo of Russell with the audience. I don't really remember that happening, but the photo exists and it really was not a thing they did often back then. We had been a good audience :)

Here's all the songs that were probably played that night in random order:

Your Call's Very Important To Us. Please Hold., B.C., Good Morning, Here In Heaven, Academy Award Performance, Those Mysteries, Falling In Love With Myself Again, Big Boy, Nicotina, Popularity, This Town Ain't Big Enough For Both Of Us, excerpts from The Seduction Of Ingmar Bergman, Tryouts For The Human Race, Katherine Hepburn, Revenge Of Two Hands One Mouth. They likely also played The Number One Song in Heaven, When Do I Get To Sing 'My Way' and Suburban Homeboy. (I see mentions of How Are You Getting Home? and How Do I Get To Carnegie Hall? in setlists for this tour as well, which they very well might have played but I very sadly have zero memory of ever hearing those songs live.)

This tour had a real air of mystery, possibly even more so than Two Hands One Mouth, as the lack of existing footage definitely adds to it. But luckily some of it *is* out there, and I am so grateful for these photos :) On top of the songs I especially mentioned above, I would also advise people to look for recordings of Tryouts For The Human Race and Popularity from this tour, because the arrangements are probably not going to be the way you expect them to be. And as you might expect: B.C. is stunning live. (I could start a whole rant about Good Morning and Suburban Homeboy live but I think I sufficiently screamed about both in my personal notes on THOM the year prior.) Final note: I know Russell had some sort of dance move for Big Boy because me and another friend couldn't stop talking about it for months. I don't remember what he did, but both THOM and TROTHOM were wonderful for Russell dances <3

#I really needed to get that out of my system and onto the blog :)#I may do one of these posts for all shows I've seen at some point.#(I know I've yet to put my notes from 2023 on here and I've been working on them!)#sparks #sparks (band)#russell mael #ron mael #the revenge of two hands one mouth #trothom #bristol #november 27 2013 #2013 #10's #i was there #I put the whole story under a read more so that you don't have to deal with that if you just want to look at photos :)

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dduane · 6 months

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Bristol, England

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lloyddavid · 2 months

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reasonsforhope · 4 months

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"On Monday this week [first week of December, 2023], workers in London’s financial centre were met with an unfamiliar sight – and sound. Around 100 chorists, some sporting bowler hats, had gathered at the headquarters of the City’s biggest fossil fuel-backing corporations to sing in protest.

The singers, encompassing a range of generations and vocal pitches, were part of the Climate Choir Movement, a network of choirs that officially launched in January 2023. While world leaders convened at the Cop28 climate summit in Dubai, they raised their voices in support of the Stop Ecocide campaign, which is working to criminalise the destruction of the environment.

The Climate Choir Movement’s co-founder Jo Flanagan first formed a choir in April 2022 with Extinction Rebellion to protest against HSBC’s fossil fuel investments at the bank’s AGM. Dressed smartly to blend in with shareholders, the singers rose up from their seats to disrupt the meeting with a rendition of the Abba classic "Money, Money, Money," the lyrics adapted to urge HSBC to finance renewable energy. [Note: A+ Song choice for this, tbh]

Flanagan had been inspired by a video of US activists singing as a flashmob in the middle of a conference speech to protest against greenwashing. “It made the hairs stand up on the back of my neck,” she recalls. “They walked out of the room in a very dignified way, still singing. I just thought, that’s the way I want to do it.”

Since then, the movement has grown from its first choir in Bristol to 10 choirs across the UK, with around 550 members at the time of writing. The local choirs organise their own rehearsals and protests, while all movement members can attend monthly sessions on Zoom where they learn new songs, to be performed at protests like the one in London.

For Ruth Routledge, who works as a singing for health practitioner and leads the Portsmouth choir in her spare time, taking part in this action was a “wonderful, uplifting” experience. “Singing and harmonising together is a very beautiful way to protest,” she says. “There’s something very gentle, very moving, and very powerful about it. It’s so vulnerable. There’s just a real naked, stripped back humanity that I think cuts through a lot of noise.”

The movement welcomes all new members, regardless of singing ability. Routledge was touched when some passersby – including “a couple of lads” – joined in with the songs.

She is eager for others to experience the sense of hope that singing together brings. “I feel very passionately about the state of the environment. I’m very concerned about my children’s futures, and I’m concerned about the whole world. It keeps me awake at night.

“Joining together means we’re not isolated, worrying that the world is on fire and no one’s going to do anything.”

For Flanagan, what sets the movement apart from other choirs that sing songs about nature is its targeted approach. “We organise very carefully choreographed, peaceful performance protests. We want to change hearts and minds.”

Seeing onlookers in tears illustrates to her what singing can achieve. “It reaches deep inside people in a way that other forms of protest can’t.”"

-via Positive.News, December 6, 2023