Live
< Magik Markers at Cargo, Shorrditch
words by Matthias Scherer
From behind the curtain separating the live venue from the rest of the bar, a four-note guitar riff rings out, pulling punters into the room almost magnetically.
Magik Markers, the subjects of their attention, are still busy noisily killing off the last shreds of harmony within that simple riff, and taking their time with it too. Hiding behind a mane of unruly hair, singer/guitarist Elisa Ambrogio mumbles an incomprehensible introduction into the microphone, before drummer Pete Nolan starts the next ‘song’, a misleading term considering its lack of structure and harmony.
Later in the set ‘Taste’ provides relatively melodic relief but is transformed into a rumbling piece of aggro-roc and loses us once again. But no matter how much Ambrogio shakes, strangles and gently strokes her guitar, she only manages to produce barely-there variations on a dirty, feedback-laden sound. More than thirty minutes of this would have been pushing it.
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