The crazy things you do when you're on Sellaband.... would I have otherwise travelled two-and-a-half hours forth and two-and-a-half hours back to see Bim do their first 6-or-7-song performance on a small open air festival in Chesham? No! Of course not! Most likely because I would have never even heard of Bim...So, I thought that being in London for a work conference would make it easy to hop over to Chesham, a short distance on the map. Not so! Busses getting stuck in rush hour and bad underground connections made me fearful of missing Bim's 16:30 performance, and when I got to realize that part of the tube journey was to be on a replacement bus service due to engineering works I was sure to miss it. It was only because I was already on that bus not knowing how long it would take that I decided to *not* get out and head back.
When I finally found Francis Yard, the location of the Drawing Room Gallery/cafe which organized the festival, it was about 18:00 so when I saw Bim on stage lugging instruments I knew I had just missed them!...
Wait a minute... it does take them an awful lot of time to get those instruments off stage... and why are they tuning and sitting down? It took a while before I believed my luck, and as it turned out they had been waiting for their own personal 'fanclub' (including Katy Davis from Gobblynne animation, who made the Second Person animation videos) to arrive on the same bus service I was on.
So, about the gig: it was good to have seen it! While delaying the performance had obviously not helped to quiet the inevitable nerves of a first gig, Bim proved they really don't need the two covers they were playing. I'm pretty sure the only reason they did play those covers is the time and effort it takes to ready all their material for live performance. Bim's own songs really stand being performed live on stage, and I believe they are accessible enough to not need famous filler songs to keep the audience's attention. It was interesting to see how the cello player they brought with them added to the material, and that the songs do not depend on the electronics that were used on their home studio recordings. Speaking of electronics... the PA system used was rather basic, proving that Rebecca's and Tim's voices are truly good even without layers of filtering and reverb. Not to say there weren't the occasional uncertain notes, but I'm very sure that was also because it just is hard to sing harmonies with just one voice per vocal group - especially when you're not used to using amplification or singing outside. More live performances will surely make Bim a live treat just as much as their recorded songs are on your own CD or mp3 player. So when they do play that concert hall in perhaps two years' time, I can say "I've seen their first gig!".
As a final note: being late did make me miss the stage acts of two other Sellaband artists, Cris Tanzi and Rachaelrachael, who made this a partial Sellaband happening (VB)
