Live Music News & Reviews

Last night Villagers showcased their new album at London’s Village Underground.

Villagers have always been a great live proposition, and tonight was no exception. The band began with Awayland opener My Lighthouse, before a rousing version of Home from 2010′s superb “Becoming a Jackal”. It became immediately apparent that the band were going to create some sweet-sounding music tonight, with Conor O’Brien cradling a small-sized acoustic and a backing band consisting of drums, keyboard, guitar and bass.

A tender version of Meaning of the Ritual followed, as the crowd hushed to enjoy every subtle chord change and vocal. Grateful Song followed, and it became apparent that even live, the songs on their first album generally beat anything on their new album. Highlights from Becoming a Jackal were The Pact, and the set-closer, an uptempo driving version of Ship of Promises.

After a brief break, Villagers returned for an encore. Or at least O’Brien did, to play an unbelievable solo version of That Day, which he claimed he wished he had recorded for the album. Anunciating every word and at times whispering over gently strummed chords, you could sometimes here cans of beet rattling around from the bar areas at the back, so entranced were the crowd. Rhythm Composer, sounding something like The Beatles, showed O’Brien has not lost his knack of writing a tune, before the band closed with three great song in Becoming a Jackal, The Waves and Nothing Arrived.

This was a superb gig, highlighting that Conor O’Brien is one of the most talented musicians around at the minute, a great songwriter and no mean guitarist with a superb voice. And Villagers showed what a great live band they still are. The new album may struggle to live up to its predecessor, but it has more than enough highs to maintain their position as a live act not to be missed.

1.My Lighthouse
2.Home
3.The Meaning of the Ritual
4.Grateful Song
5.Set the Tigers Free
6.Passing a Message
7.The Bell
8.Memoir (2-piece)
9.In a Newfoundland You are Free
10.On a Sunlit Stage
11.The Pact (I’ll Be Your Fever)
12.Earthly Pleasure
13.Judgement Call
14.Ship of Promises
Encore:
15.That Day (Solo)
16.Rhythm Composer
17.Becoming a Jackal
18.The Waves
19.Nothing Arrived

Last night hip hop’s hottest property, Compton’s Kendrick Lamar, played a sold out show at the Hammersmith Apollo.

The excitement before Kendrick appeared was palpable, with a young enthusiastic crowd looking forward to what was only Lamar’s second performance in London, after he played Camden’s Electric Ballroom last year on his Section:80 tour. This was a rare treat to see a rapper on top of his game shortly after the release of the superb Good Kid…M.A.A.D. City.

Coming on stage with just his DJ, it was a minimal set-up, although the lights were impressive enough. Kendrick began with a number of songs from Section:80, including the superb ADHD, which had the whole crowd jumping up and down, “12 bottles in the case, fuck that, 2 pills and a half weight, fuck that…” Lamar was continually impressed by how the crowd seemed to know every word to every song, and would occasionally turn the music off to rap with the crowd.

The first song from Good Kid…received a huge cheer, The Art of Peer Pressure. This song deals, like much of the album, with Kendrick’s internal conflicts between the harsh realities of life in Compton and his attempts to better himself and live a good life. Here he is doing all the things he wouldn’t normally do because he is “with my homies”. Kendrick raised things further with a superb version of “Bitch Don’t Kill my Vibe”. Between songs Lamar chatted and joked with the crowd but it was his MC-ing skills which most impressed, with plenty of freestyling at the end of songs.

Other highlights included “Money Trees”, “Poetic Justice” and “M.A.A.d City”, before a rousing version of “The Recipe”, Kendrick’s ode to his home county, the land of “women weed weather”. The show finished with an epic “Swimming Pool”. At one hour and twenty minutes there were a few more songs from Good Kid I would have liked to hear, in particular the superb “Dying of Thirst” and “Good Kid” but you couldn’t fault the effort and energy Kendrick Lamar put into the show tonight. Great MC-ing, great rhymes, great beats and a proper showman. Make sure you catch him next time he visits these shores.

The NME have published their top 50 albums of 2012. We would have liekd to have seen Kendrick Lamarr much higher, and wouldn’t have had Alt-J anywhere near teh top ten, but we think it is a pretty fair list in what has hardly been a vintage year for music. What are your thoughts?

50 Purity Ring Shrines
49 Flying Lotus Until The Quiet Comes
48 The 2 Bears Be Strong
47 John Talabot fIN
46 Bobby Womack The Bravest Man In The Universe
45 Lana Del Rey Born To Die
44 Kendrick Lamar Good Kid, mAAd City
43 Ratking Wiki93
42 Paul Weller Sonik Kicks
41 Ty Segall Twins
40 Polica Give You The Ghost
39 Liars WIXIW
38 TEED Trouble
37 Enter Shikari A Flash Flood Of Colour
36 The Vaccines – Come Of Age
35 Metz Metz
34 Bat For Lashes The Haunted Man
33 Hot Chip In Our Heads
32 Graham Coxon A+E
31 G.O.O.D. Music Cruel Summer
30 Breton Other Peoples Problems
29 Mac DeMarco 2
28 Spiritualized Sweet Heart, Sweet Light
27 Jessie Ware Devotion
26 Spector Enjoy It While It Lasts
25 Ariel Pink Mature Themes
24 Merchandise Children Of Desire
23 Richard Hawley Standing At The Skys Edge
22 Beach House Bloom
21 Cat Power Sun
20 Howler America Give Up
19 Toy Toy
18 Tribes Baby
17 Grizzly Bear Shields
16 Melodys Echo Chamber Melodys Echo Chamber
15 Sharon Van Etten Tramp
14 The xx Coexist
13 DIIV Oshin
12 David Byrne & St. Vincent Love This Giant
11 Django Django Django Django
10 Jack White Blunderbuss
09 Jake Bugg Jake Bugg
08 The Cribs In The Belly Of The Brazen Bull
07 Pond Beard Wives Denim
06 The Maccabees Given To The Wild
05 Alt-J An Awesome Wave
04 Crystal Castles (iii)
03 Frank Ocean Channel Orange
02 Grimes Visions
01 Tame Impala Lonerism

Goldenvoice, the people behind Coachella Music Festival, have today announced that they will be running two cruises this December. The cruises will be to the Bahamas from 16-19 December, and Jamaica from 19-23 December. The ship will be headlined by Pulp, Hot Chip, Girl Talk, Yeasayer and James Murphy.

http://ss.coachella.com/index.php#

Jack White, Brixton Academy

Jack White tore up Brixton Academy this evening, playing almost the entirety of his excellent new album Blunderbuss, together with a generous sprinkling of White Stripes songs. One thing that was made clear as everyone arrived was that no recording or photos would be allowed. This was emphasised by the roadie, who introduced the band by saying that the crowd should enjoy Jack White live rather than watch the gig through an LCD screen. Hallelujah and well said that man.

Appearing on stage with his male band (Jack White tours with an all-male and an all-female backing band and lets them know over breakfast which will be performing that night), they launched into a slowed-down, speeded-up, slowed-down version of Black Math, from the White Stripes’ superb Elephant. What was immediately apparent was how different this was to a White Stripes gig – richer sonically, with a band consisting of a superb keyboardist, a double bass player, a slide guitarist, banjo player and an excellent drummer.

Highlights included Love Interruption, Blunderbuss and Hypocritical Kiss. White also rewarded the appreciative crowd with a singalong in the form of We Are Going to be Friends, and a blistering version of Ball and Biscuit, here transformed with the addition of some superb keyboard work. Throughout, Jack White produced the usual startling sounds from his guitar and generally staggered around the stage performing guitar hero shapes. This man definitely has the mojo inside him. Another highlight was a funky – yes funky – version of Dead Leaves on the Dirty Ground, with Jack White on the piano, back to back with the keyboardist on the organ.

After a ten minute call for more, when not a person left the Academy, White returned to play Sixteen Saltines and a powerful Button to Button, before ending with an epic version of Blunderbuss’s Take Me With You When You Go. A short-ish gig at around one hour twenty minutes, but you couldn’t really complain considering the amount of energy Jack White puts into his live performances. Catch him while you can.

Setlist:

‘Black Math’
‘Missing Pieces’
‘Weep Themselves To Sleep’
‘Hypocritical Kiss’
‘Top Yourself’
‘Hotel Yorba’
‘Trash Tongue Talker’
‘Dead Leaves And The Dirty Ground’
‘Two Against One’
‘I Cut Like A Buffalo’
‘Freedom at 21′
‘We’re Going To Be Friends’
‘Blunderbuss’
‘Poor Boy’
‘Ball And Biscuit’
’16 Saltines’
‘The Hardest Button to Button’
‘Take Me With You When You Go’

Last night Hot Chip played at London’s Heaven, in what was something of a warm-up for their forthcoming Lovebox appearance.

For many this was the first chance to hear some of the tracks of their new album In Our Heads, released this Monday. However, Hot Chip are crowd pleasers, so any fears they would overload the set with new songs were allayed when they brought out a mellow version of Boy From School after opening with a new track.

The new album has had mixed reviews, and although I have only heard the singles, the new tracks played tonight mostly sounded great. In particular, Flutes was the moment of the night, a tune to rival Over and Over or Ready for the Floor, both of which were also aired tonight.

The crowd, though hot and sweaty in the underground atmosphere of Heaven, danced throughout, and in fact seeing Hot Chip live it is often hard to do anything else.  Five albums in it becomes clear just how many great tunes Hot chip now have in their arsenal, as they played I Feel Better, One Night Stand, and a number of songs from the under-rated Made in the Dark, including an epic version of Hold On in their encore.

Throughout the gig band members took turns doing the guitar hero bit, but for the most part they stayed behind their keyboards.

All in all a top, great fun gig, and a good sign of a party in store for Loveboxers this weekend.

Jay-Z and Kanye West make an unlikely pairing when you first think about it. You wonder how the relationship works given they both seem to have egos the size of the planet. Last year’s (surprisingly good) Watch The Throne album gave them equal billing, and that policy continued with tonight’s 2 and a half-hour show at the O2 Arena.

Jay-Z and Kanye at the O2 Arena

Jay-Z and Kanye appeared to tumltous applause on top of two opposing stages, which raised up to form to towers with graphics on the sides. They began with “H.A.M” and “Who Gon Stop Me” before the superb “Otis”, which samples Try a Little Tenderness. From then on in they do roughly twenty minutes each, and it becomes apparent just what great back catalogues these two have. If anything it is Kanye who provides the greater spectacle, his songs, particular his more recent ones, being more epic and interesting when compared to Jay-Z more classic old-kool style hip hop. “All the Lights”, “Monster” “Power” and “Runaway” hit all the right notes. Jay’z meanwhile excels on “Hard-Knock Life”, “H.O.V.A.” and “Run This Town”.

Kanye West, Watch the Throne Tour

Then there are the hits you might have forgotten about, like “Empire State of Mind” and “Diamonds of Sierra Leone”. The entire two and a half hours is entertaining and is one big hip hop party. The finale, when the pair ran through “Niggas in Paris” FOUR times was a great way to round off the show. A top night from two rappers who really know what they are doing.

Jay-z, Watch the Throne tour

Setlist

H•A•M
Who Gon’ Stop Me
Otis
Welcome to the Jungle
Gotta Have It
Where I’m From
Jigga What, Jigga Who (Originator ’99)
Can’t Tell Me Nothing
All Falls Down
Flashing Lights
Jesus Walks
Diamonds from Sierra Leone (Remix)
Public Service Announcement (Interlude)
U Don’t Know
Run This Town
Monster
Power/Power Remix
New Day
Hard Knock Life (The Ghetto Anthem)
Izzo (H.O.V.A.)
Empire State of Mind
Runaway
Heartless
Stronger
On to the Next One
Dirt Off Your Shoulder
I Just Wanna Love U (Give it to Me)
That’s My Bitch
Good Life
Touch the Sky
All of the Lights
Big Pimpin’
Gold Digger
99 Problems
No Church in the Wild
Lift Off (Interlude)
Niggas in Paris
Niggas in Paris
Niggas in Paris
Niggas in Paris

Nashville’s Black Belles played a sold out show at Brixton’s Windmill on Saturday night. The all-female gothic band are signed to Jack White’s Third Man label – if it’s good enough for Jack White it’s good enough for me so I decided to check them out.

The Black Belles, Brixton Windmill

Until a few weeks ago the Black Belles were a four-piece, but tonight only three appeared on stage. It transpired that the keyboardist had very recently left. Given that the keys were fairly prominent in the few tracks I had checked out prior to this gig I was hoping their sound would not be too diminished. I needn’t have worried – singer/guitarist Olivia Jean is straight from the Jack White mold – she has the mojo in her and is a superb guitarist.

The Black Belles have a gothic look, with jet black hair, pale make-up and wear long black dresses with black hats. Their music is straight up garage rock though, not too dissimilar to the White Stripes, and that is no bad thing. Consisting of short three-minute songs, with some killer guitar solos the Black Belles are a great live act, and they look fantastic too.

The Black Belles, Windmill

A special mention for one of the support acts tonight as well – Black Moth, a rock outfit from Leeds, were superb. With two guitarists, a bassist, drummer, and singer they just about managed to fit on the Windmill’s tiny stage, but there were some superb guitar-work and proper attitude from the frontwoman, they sounded great.

Black Moth, Brixton Windmill

The last time I saw New Order was a shambolic performance at a very muddy Glastonbury in 2005. They weren’t great then so I was hopeful of a better performance tonight in the more intimate setting of Brixton Academy.

As the band took to the stage it was immediately noticeable that Bernard Sumner has recently acquired a spare tyre. But then most of us have let ourselves go a little bit, so we can surely forgive that. Unfortunately, what is harder to forgive, was the awful sound quality for the first half of the set. I have heard some great live gigs at Brixton Academy so we can’t blame the venue here, but the vocals were buried very deep in the mix and the keyboards were not prominent enough. Fortunately, the sound quality improved along with the overall quality in the second half of the set.

The slightly lacklustre first half of the set included the likes of Regret, Ceremony, Age of Consent, nothing that managed to kick the crowd into life. The first moment occurred after about half an hour, with the superb Bizarre Love Triangle, but again, the keyboards should have been louder for this, and when a song so great falls slightly flat that is a worry. Sumner had put down his guitar for this and instead commenced some drunk uncle dancing, although to be fair to the man he was never even meant to be a frontman until Ian Curtis died, and has never been the confident swaggering sort.

With poor sound, the obvious absence of Peter Hook and the inability of a mumbling Sumner to rouse the crowd, I was worried that the whole gig could be a letdown but things were about to pick up. True Faith was followed by an electric version of 586, matched with superb lighting and visuals. Well into their stride now, they continued with The Perfect Kiss, followed by the much-anticipated Blue Monday, which hit the right spot. This was topped however with Temptation, which was a great moment, the crowd singing along to “Oh you’ve got blue eyes, oh you’ve got green eyes….”, and the epic nature of the moment in itself almost saving the gig.

I hadn’t read any reviews of this tour so was unprepared for what came in the encore. A beautiful surprise, they started the intro to Transmission. What a great song, and how well it has aged. New Order playing this sounded as good as they had all night, and suddenly there were no apparent issues with the sound. This was followed by a slightly cheesey version of Love Will Tear Us Apart (Sumner squealing “Alright” and “Come On” between choruses didn’t help), and whilst a crowd-pleaser, I would have preferred to hear something like She’s Lost Control. Whilst Joy Divison’s most famous song, the problem with Love Will…is that it doesn’t really go anywhere, and this becomes very apparent when hearing it live, it is just verse chorus verse chorus. It could even be described as (whisper it) a bit of a dirge.

If New Order had just played for the last half an hour it would have been a storming, if slightly poor value for money gig. That is what they will probably do at festivals, and the Hyde Park Olympic gig, so do catch them if they are playing in a field near you. On this tour however, I felt the set was a little too hit and miss. Maybe New Order have never been a great live band. They improvised little in terms of the more epic numbers, failing to elongate the keyboard moments and turning the Academy into a dancing throng as I expected, but their set was saved with a superb closing run of songs that is testament to the five or six truly great songs the band have produced.

This week’s Time Out magazine features the results of their poll to find London’s best music venue. The winner was Islington’s excellent Union Chapel which, as anyone who has visited will testify, offers a unique atmosphere for a gig in stunning surroundings. Second on the list was Cecil Sharp House, followed by the always-fun and tremendously hard-working Windmill in Brixton.

The full list is as follows:

1. Union Chapel
2. Cecil Sharp House
3. The Windmill
4. The Lexington
5. Brixton Academy
6. Koko
7. Royal Albert Hall
8. Vortex Jazz Club
9. Roundhouse
10. Alexandra Palace