Post-2000
indie bands, and I count most of my musical existence from that point onward,
have bequeathed us a certain disdain for anything too obvious, songwriters intellectualize
everything and then release a cryptic love song. Phoenix, on the other hand, are
in the business of delivering sensations that, more often that not, get you
heart racing like it does in the first days of flirting with a work colleague.
You want to wear something nice for a change, girls get their hair done and
before you know it, you're daydreaming about running in the rain in Paris while
the love of your life chases you into a steamy wine bar. And it doesn't seem at
all odd that you would even find yourself wishing for such a pathetic thing.
They
didn't play Fences - that alone ought
to be the only sentence in this review, as a sort of punishment, and if it
weren't for everything else they played - masterfully - it would be. Fences is
a great tune. But let's say it's a forgivable lapse when the rest of the
performance is punctuated by covers of Playground
Love with Nicolas Godin himself on stage and A Cappella versions of Sick for the Big Sun.
I
think I forgive them.
Phoenix
aren't exactly your everyday grandiose stadium band but at the Brixton Academy
on Wednesday they delivered and incredible show: entertaining, clever and
leaving very little to chance, Thomas Mars and team sang about love as if they
were going through the day's to-do list - "I'll marry you on
Tuesday", he goes, like it's nothing. Disarming, that's the word.
Entertainment kicks off the
night, it's the first single from their new album Bankrupt!, a synth-heavy
concoction, fit for a Californian hotel lounge at times; others for an 80's hen
party. The new work blends very trendy techniques such as loud keyboard,
half-tempo double clapping and Casablancas-like distortion with tunes hovering
R&B and House. After listening to this album, it won't come as a surprise
to you that Daft Punk are old friends of the band and Casablancas himself was a
guest singer and producer in the latter highly praised Random Access Memories.
It's all in the annoyingly talented family.
Crafted
to a filigree of detail in studio, Phoenix's music loses some of its layers on
stage and that's one of the great joys of watching densely produced bands, the
cathartic release they get from playing their songs in a less analytic
environment washes over everyone.
The
room is warming up and we're all prime to jump around. Lasso and Liztomania, two
heavy-weight crowd pleasers from their nearly perfect 2009's "Wolfgang
Amadeus Phoenix" follow suit. One couldn't help but admiring the courage -
what would they grab the audience with from this point on?
Well.
Oh
well well well well well well until you know me well", starts
"Girlfriend", another chunk of gooey and ironic love from
"Amadeus" as the album is tenderly referred to. Mars's echoey vocals
are like home-made jam, you just know you're safe now.
"Run
Run Run" is next, what a tune straight from their 2004
"Alphabetical". The opening guitar is very similar to the cadence of
a mellow-er Radiohead and it falls like sugar cubes each time Mars goes
"fallin', fallin', fallin'"
By
the way people are dancing, it's like we've all just been teleported to the
sleek lounge of a Monaco casino in the 80s. With what looks like synthetic
whistles, Trying to be Cool comes on - "I'm just trying to be cool. And
it's all because of you" is a good a pick-up line for a room full of
loved-up sarcastic fans as you'll ever gonna get.
The
first M83 borrowed tunes of Chloroform kick
in and again we're all letting our arms swing there along our torso while we
close our eyes and actually nothing
else is of much importance.
"Thank
you very much Brixton."
Yeah,
right.
They
come back to gothic organs. The whole floor trembles and then Mars slips into
his negligé and sings Sick for
the Big Sun with no safety net, barely any guitar and even the room is silence
like we're at the Opera or a classic concert venue. A room full of rock fans
listening to a lead singer and not attempting to sing as well? Blimey.
Rome finishes it and I
leave the room with the sensation of having been showed around the world
through the blurred windows of an old friend's car. A friend I was always
secretively more than friends with.
Ana França
