Last night, the usually sophisticate-heavy Velvet Underground was swagged by a horde of indie kids (and some adults) for the Fred Perry Subculture Night party. The wholeshindig was to promote local music with bands such as Inch Chua & The Metric System, Breakbeat Theory and Caracal headlining. And with all free throwdowns, the VU was filled with some true fans and lookie-loos, all prepped and dressed up in Fred Perry laurels. Not to mention the freeloading set as 42Below was doling out screwdrivers, and vodka lime and apple cocktails.
Unlike the first installment at Home Club, this party, surprisingly didn’t see a capacity crowd, possibly due to the weather. When the promise of free drinks doesn’t work, something must be amiss. It might be due to the fact that it’s a working day on Friday and the previous installment, although held on a Thursday was a holiday
eve. Nonetheless, the organizers tried to make do with it and threw a decent show.
Music-wise, this second party didn’t live up to the debut when bands such as I Am David Sparkle, The Karl Maka and For This Cycle rocked the house. Inch Chua & The Metric System kicked things off with a commendable set. The pint-sized Chua tried her best to banter and worked the crowd (they sounded like early No Doubt) but the free flow was still ongoing, and to choose between free drinks and local music… Do we really have to answer this?
Even the lush electronica of Breakbeat Theory couldn’t get the party started. The four-piece live electronica act had a couple of hiccups in their set when the drummer fumbled on a drum ‘n’ bass number. But probably noiseniks Caracal saved the night with their guitar-rock.
Still, we were all swayed by night’s end (DJ Hong rounded off the night with some slick techno and electro) and definitely big ups to Fred Perry for celebrating subculture and plugging local music to the masses, for free.
