O.C. POP MUSIC REVIEW : A Mission Botched by All the Pomp

As Mission U.K. took the Coach House stage Monday night, “Pomp and Circumstance” resounded through the hall, and a smoke machine billowed at full tilt.

Seventeen songs and nearly 90 minutes later, the artificial fog was still flowing incessantly, and lead singer Wayne Hussey’s overbearing pomp had long since become a pretentious circumstance of the evening.

If this were a band of lesser talent and creative drive, a performance marked by such stilted rock conventions could be quickly dismissed and forgotten.

But, as evidenced by the Mission’s solid body of work produced over the past four years and the flashes of riveting fury it frequently displayed during Monday’s show, this is a band capable of brilliance.

The smoke-machine annoyance, of course, is one endemic of many groups born during England’s gothic age. But it was a contrived mood prop when Kiss used it on stage a decade and a half ago, and it still is in 1990--except now it’s also weathered and tedious.

For a band with the Mission’s ability to weave a mood so distinctly through their music, to fill the room with CO2muddles the atmosphere it creates rather than sharpens it.

Still, nothing soothes the irritation of a vintage smoke machine like slashing guitar riffs, driving rhythms and heartfelt vocals.

The Mission supplied all those remedies, if, in some cases, only occasionally. But there was still Hussey’s rock-star posturing to contend with.

Perhaps the Mission has attracted too much popular and critical acclaim back in Britain, or maybe the screaming gothic girls who religiously flock to the band’s performances have spawned an uncontrollable Missionmania.

Whatever the case, Hussey’s primping, posturing and occasional writhing on the stage floor slowed the concert’s momentum every time the band revved into overdrive.

Nothing was convincingly spontaneous about Hussey’s stage presence. You got the impression that each detail of his every movement was carefully choreographed, to be played out each night with an actor’s precision.

Well enough if the staged actions tie together a theme, in the vein of Bowie or Zappa, but Hussey’s movements amounted to little more than a rote recitation of pop cliches.

The most obvious example was the appearance of a seductive belly dancer during the band’s “Sea of Love.”

As the music surged forth from the ballad intro, a girl clad in Gypsy attire emerged from the crowd and joined Hussey on stage. The moment, at first, seemed a refreshing splash of spontaneity. But, alas, as she flirtingly draped her chartreuse scarf around the lead singer, who in turn carried out his rehearsed dance steps, it became obvious that this, too, was a prearranged stunt.

But for all Hussey’s posing, he remains a distinctive and often inspired vocalist. And, fortified with a seasoned, dynamic corps of musicians, the Mission more than occasionally reached heights of intensity.

High marks included versions of such driving numbers as “Wasteland,” “Serpent’s Kiss” and “Beyond the Pale,” accentuated by a set-ending crescendo of its latest single, “Deliverance.” Meanwhile, the group offered new twists to its studio treatments of the Beatles’ “Tomorrow Never Knows,” which opened the show, and Neil Young’s “Like a Hurricane,” which highlighted the second and final encore.

The Mission’s occasional ferocity owes its greatest debt to drummer Mick Brown, a sweaty workhorse who frequently upstaged his band mates with brilliant displays of controlled percussion abuse. Even at the depths of Hussey’s cliche-ridden stage stalking, Brown seized the moment and elevated the music to a more worthy level.

Accented by Craig Adams’ steady bass rhythms and Simon Hinkler’s unassuming, yet impressive lead guitar work, Brown’s performance salvaged what might otherwise have been an altogether disappointing showing.

In contrast, the Masters of Reality, who opened the show, offered a searing performance that outdistanced its studio efforts, which are impressive in themselves.

Aside from Tim Harrington’s guitar-hero tendencies, this Syracuse, N.Y.-based quartet displayed a quirky, impassioned performance suggesting that hard rock may have a future after all.

The band’s character is embodied in lead vocalist/guitarist Chris Goss, an overweight, crazed cowboy with a short ponytail--and a penchant for distilling hard rock down its purest elements, shedding the music of any hint of bombast or pretension.

Together, Goss, Harrington, bassist Googe and drummer Vinnie Ludovico are as tight and as loud a band of rockers as one might hope for. In just a seven-song set, the music traversed over a wide range of rock influences, from Black Sabbath to the Rolling Stones to Creedence Clearwater Revival, but laced with an offbeat humor and unpredictability that lended a new urgency to familiar sounds.

Though still in its infancy, Masters of Reality may well be deserving of the critical acclaim that inexplicably has been bestowed upon Guns N’ Roses--except that these Masters are for real.