BATTLES (London Scala, 16/05/07)

After a run of rather disappointing shows, I approached Wednesday’s Battles show with a degree of trepidation. Despite the fact that everyone I know who’s seen them have been unanimous in their praise for this New York quartet, I’ve found the majority of their recorded material rather underwhelming. Yet the almost reverential hype around their live shows piqued my interest, so I headed Scala-wards to see what all the fuss was about. The supports certainly didn’t inspire confidence; Clark bored me to tears with his insipid, dated electro piped straight out of a laptop, and Four Tet’s “DJ Set,” consisting of Kieran Hebden occasionally coming out of the dressing room to pick his nose and put on some mind-numbingly pedestrian beats, begged the question, “how much is he getting paid?”

Needless to say, the headliners had to be something special to redeem the evening. And special they were. In fact, they were one of the top five live acts I’ve seen in my life, and as someone who’s seen more than his fair share of top-tier musicians, that’s pretty fucking good! They’re hard to pin down musically; they employ wonky time-signatures and unusual rhythmic patterns a la 65daysofstatic intertwined with the mesmerising grooves of the Earlies, flavoured with avant-garde knob-twiddling and vocodor-ed vocals. In many ways they reminded me of a less skinny-jeaned version of Broken Social Scene- they make a huge fuck-off racket that slowly coalesces into something that unexpectedly makes perfect sense. What makes them special though is their top-notch musicianship- they seem almost to almost effortlessly play in perfect sync no matter how odd or complex the rhythmic demands of their music and it’s all executed with a relentless energy, enhanced by the fact they play so close to the front of the stage. The drummer, in particular, deserves an award for his frankly awe-inspiring performance- within ten minutes he was completely drenched in sweat, and by the mid-set mark he looked like he was going to die but he still hit those drums so hard you could see the sawdust flying off. The highlight naturally was the mindblowing “Atlas” but despite their experimental nature, the band only rarely ruined the flow of the set by descending into atonal BSS-style wankery. But that said, even the few moments of pretentiousness couldn’t ruin such a spectacular performance and when it all ended, you could just hear everyone turning to their friends and saying “that was AWESOME!” It’s a shame that their inaccessible albums will put a lot of people off, but hopefully word-of-mouth will give this incredibly exciting band the audience it totally deserves.

Oh, and the keyboardist started beat-boxing at one point. It was fucking awesome.

THE TWILIGHT SAD (London Borderline, 10/05/07)

First thing I noticed about the Twilight Sad is that they're more Scottish than Robert The Bruce, Alan Hansen and the Proclaimers combined. I'd not heard a note by them before I entered the Borderline, but the lead singer's Caledonian burr is doubtlessly their most distinctive feature; for my money, I thought it made a really nice change from ye typical indie whine. The frontman's also commendably confident and passionate when performing, although he did come across as too arrogant to be charismatic. Shame that their tunes were desperately average then- true, they were battling against a sub-par sound mix but apart from a couple of fantastic moments when the whole band hit a lot of things REALLY REALLY HARD to create a gloriously ear-melting cacophony, I thought they were rather dull. After all the hype and praise that's been lavished upon them, I was expecting a lot better- maybe I just caught them on a bad night, but the next big thing? I bloody well hope not.

CAT POWER (Kentish Town Forum, 1/5/07)

Bounding across the stage dressed alarmingly like Lady Sovereign, the inimitable Chan Marshall (AKA Cat Power) certainly cuts a more confident figure than her reputation would suggest. The erratic live act of days past, prone to fluffing songs and on-stage breakdowns has given way to a more assured, if still eccentric performer and it’s certainly good to see her in such good spirits. Sadly, this new found happiness has come at the expense of the vulnerability that made her voice so intensely moving; the rawness that infuses her most striking performances is all but gone. Inevitably, I found myself comparing her performance last night to the magnificent show put on by that other much-feted songstress Leslie Feist the other day and unfortunately Chan didn’t even compare. The major disappointment was the instrumentation- whilst Feist’s musicians subtly complemented her delightful vocals, Cat Power’s overwhelmed her. A voice like hers deserves arrangements that accentuate its fragile beauty; it certainly didn’t need swamping by a pub-blues backing band, which to be perfectly honest is what they were. All the understated reserve of the album was eschewed for a subtle-as-a-brick country-rock vibe that was rarely deviated from; even “The Greatest” was delivered in a depressingly workmanlike fashion. Only occasionally did the backing band decide to hold back and allow us all-too-fleeting glimpses of her outstanding talent. Maybe I’m being a bit harsh, even on an off-night she’s better than most singer-songwriters, but there’s no escaping the fact she simply didn’t live up to my expectations. Shame.