GIG REVIEWS
|
|
GIG REVIEWS |
|
Futureheads
@ Leeds University Stylus 27.01.08 www.vanguard-online.co.uk
First up, this evening – the painfully careful and beautiful Grammatics – latest hot property for Leeds’ Dance To The Radio label. It’s not often you get to hear a cello at a gig. Their bedsit intensity impresses while failing to move us, making them a good warm up for the blistering heat of the Futureheads.
The retro stylings of Stylus, all sixties wood panelling, is packed to the gills with sweaty folks, all pretty hyped up and movement is difficult. The atmosphere is further hyped up by the choice of Carl Orff’s O Fortuna from his Carmina Burana. Pompous and the favoured entrance music of the Flaming Lips, who recorded an album called Hit To Death In Future Head. Clever, eh? Such fancy thought is brought to a halt with a sonic onslaught of three very fast songs. The band blast around the stage, creating a buzz before some more paced songs. Shouts go out and banter is exchanged. “You sound like children whining” says Barry. “Play the first album” shouts someone. “This is off the first”, he says, as they break into A To B.
The singles prompt crowd involvement – clapping and singing. Hounds Of Love prompts a small explosion and “ah ah ah ahs echoing round the room. Each song seems to be taken at triple speed and it is right in your face. Kate Bush was never like this.
A new one – This Is Not The World – promises more of the same for the third album. Futureheads are a band with a lot to prove. Having been dropped by their label after two albums, the third is a real tester for them and playing small packed venues like this is a chance for them to feel the buzz of audience devotion before stepping up, they hope, to bigger venues again. It seems the support is there, let’s hope it’s not just short-term nostalgia from recent students.
The crowd is having a blast with the fast and furious attack. The atmosphere is one of a good crack and jokes fly around, along with dreadful puns. “Do any of you have Radio Hearts?” asks Barry while Ross adds excited quips that are lost in the noise. Pug Tango is a change in beat that breaks and steadies. As the end approaches I wonder how they manage to make the encore – Piece Of Crap - louder and faster when they’d already reached the speed of light and volume of a thunderclap. Lights flash in our faces and sweat builds till, in a moment, the seventy minute set is over and it’s a relief – I don’t think we or they could have kept that pace up any longer. |
