Having busked outside record labels to secure a deal, these three lads from the North looked destined for the big time. But when their debut single stalled in the lower regions of the charts they hopped over the water to support a certain Ms Spears and found a ready audience in the process.
A boy band with a difference the lads play their own instruments, sing live and believe it or not write their own songs. With chiselled features and Ultrabrite white teeth, which if looked at directly can cause temporary blindness, they are back on British soil and waving the Union Jack as they go for a second bite of the cherry.
Tonight's showcase, with it's lack of any alcohol or atmosphere has been arranged after their support on the Mel C tour fell through due to the Sporty one cancelling all her dates. So Mark Barry, Christian Burns and Ste McNally (and no that isn't a spelling mistake, and no there aren't any prizes for guessing how they got their name) take the stage to celebrate the recently re-released 'Back Here' becoming their first British top ten hit instead.
Steering their course right down the middle of the road their sound is not dissimilar to Ronan Keating's rock-lite solo fare. The only difference being that BBMak make the ex-Boyzone star and his band look like a filthier version of Slayer. They introduce their backing crew of session players with a few lame gags; for instance we are told that the drummer likes Jaffa cakes and they all fall about. Cutting edge humour this most certainly isn't. Their bass player is christened 'Master of Funk' which is quite odd considering the fact that none of their tunes contains even a much needed pinch of the stuff. And they slap each other on the back just for being great guys. It's at this point that I wish I'd brought along an airline sick bag, just in case you understand.
Virtually every song is introduced by one of the three stating that they are going to slow things down just a little bit more, strange as if it were any slower they'd grind to a juddering halt. Then just to make things truly nauseating they descend into the realms of Pan Pipe Moods as their guitarless lead singer produces a set of bagpipes and plays an instrumental Irish tinged ditty that would have B*Witched rolling around in hysterics. Then comes their masterstroke, a cover of eighties soft metal has beens Extreme's 'More Than Words'. Truncated and polished to pristine perfection their version is so devoid of any real emotion that it sounds like nothing more than an exercise set by their voice coach.
So unthreatening it's genuinely frightening BBMak are essentially featherweight, FM radio friendly rock hell with a classically good-looking barbershop trio as frontmen. The kind of skin crawlingly, cringeworthy nonsense that causes your least favourite Auntie to drag you off your seat at a wedding reception and chastise you for not dancing and being a spoil sport. Thoroughly hideous.
