With a prolonging walk towards the doors of my local music hotspot, Electric Circus in Edinburgh, I wasn’t really sure what I should be gearing up for.  I was on my way to see Honningbarna.  The information I have is that they are a Punk Rock band from Kristiansand.  That’s in Norway.   I am also aware that all their songs are sung Norwegian so I am not to understand a word.  My shallow mind occasionally got the better off me and I was un-keen before the show even started.

I arrived during their line check and Fredrik Justnes, the guitar player was reeling off blues riff after blues riff, Hendrix, Page, Mayer, all class stuff.  My open mind is back.  I’m keen again.

The venue was unfortunately a little quite for the lads who did their best to round up a crowd by approaching table and asking people to get front and centre for the show.  I like that, its great effort whoever you are.  Front and centre we go.

The incredibly young looking 19 year old lads bounce on stage with an unusual line up, for example Edvard Valberg the lead singer was sitting down tuning his cello.  Not what I would normally expect, then out of nowhere, BOOM the show starts.

Guitars are howling with Led Zeppelin styled riffs with backing from a seriously phat beat and a Rage Against The Machine styled vocal mix.

It’s a big entrance from the youngsters who were so full of energy it was difficult to comprehend that it wasn’t all just put on for the sake of a show, rather than it coming naturally.   The band lurches straight into the second song and it would appear I was wrong, they were only warming up during the first track.

The singer spent most of the four minutes on the floor moshing with the crowd.  The energy was massive, even the tame music fan would have to have been drawn in by it.  Bravo to the lads, they caught everyone’s attention with style and sheer noise and that’s not easy on a school night let alone with a language barrier.

The set was incredibly well pieced together, the songs flowed easily with all a very well balanced stops in between tracks.  Quite frankly they broke down the language barrier and the brick wall they had to climb to get a rise from an Edinburgh Crowd on a Tuesday night.   It was made to look easy.  I was given the distinct impression that these guys play flat out no matter what the venue, crowd or night of the week and they go by the rule that music is the only language that matters.

Honningbarna translated into English means ‘Honey Children’.  They have melody, they have harmonies, they have a young edge (tracksuit tops), but most of all they have sheer noise and energy behind them.  They turned a quite crowd into a full on punk mosh pit.  I strongly suggest that is you have a rock and roll bone in your body and you have the opportunity to do so, that you head along to a Honningbarna show.  It was one of the best small rock and roll shows I have seen in a long time.

Jack Rowberry.