During the section of Judgment Day reserved for crimes against music, Led Zeppelin will surely face the sternest punishment for ruining the potential of countless slavish young acolytes. While Page and Plant were preposterous enough during their early 1970s peak, at least they had some claim on originality. But fifth-generation copyists such as Wolfmother sound like a pointless evolutionary dead end, the duck-billed platypus of ballsy blues rock. Witnessing the Australian quartet’s Manchester show was like stepping into an episode of Life on Mars.
Formed as a trio in Sydney a decade ago, Wolfmother released only one album before splitting in 2008. However, the original vocalist and guitarist Andrew Stockdale has kept the name, regrouping last year with new band members, a new album and no discernible change of direction. This show was still firmly rooted in an Afro-haired, skinny-jeaned, screechy-voiced parody of 1973.
Wolfmother clearly enjoy a large and enthusiastic following, even if it is testosterone-heavy, to judge by the 90 per cent male crowd in Manchester. Tracks from their album Cosmic Egg were received with great enthusiasm. New Moon Rising had some of the tribal clatter and snarling guitar motifs of vintage Black Sabbath, while White Feather blasted along on the funkiest rhythm of the evening. A beefed-up, crunchy version of the bittersweet power ballad Far Away was even greeted with a twinkly constellation of cigarette lighters. Totally old school.
Older tracks, including Woman and Apple Tree, the latter sounding uncannily like The White Stripes, undoubtedly had a raw energy and rough charm. Likewise, the closing number Joker and the Thief, an unwittingly close cousin of Spinal Tap’s boogie-blues classic Tonight I’m Gonna Rock You Tonight. But as the Darkness once proved, irony and affectionate pastiche will only get you so far. Besides, Stockdale’s lumpen borrowings from the rock canon are entirely devoid of such wit, subtlety or self-awareness.
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In fairness, there is something perversely admirable in the way Stockdale has managed to resist conventional notions of musical progress, and even chronological time itself. It must have taken a heroically blinkered effort to remain this blindly in thrall to such a narrow chapter in rock history. Indeed, the band’s career has already lasted way beyond the golden age of hairy-knuckled blues rock, which spanned the late 1960s to the mid 1970s. Respect is due for their sheer, grim-faced dedication to an entirely futile cause.
Birmingham Academy, tonight; Brixton Academy, SW9 Thurs; UEA, Norwich, Fri