Extreme Listening Mode!

From contributor Chenks;

Hot on the heels of their triumphant set at Glasto, there was much anticipation from this correspondant when a friend was able to pass on some last-minute briefs for this sold-out gig. Then I realised that we were in the all-seater Concert Hall and I started to get a bit concerned as to how that would work.

Confession-time here – at a towering 5’3″ of Weegie womanhood my gig-going experience is often dependent on the height of the people between me and the stage, especially in some of our great city’s less salubrious venues. I am forever complaining about not being able to see, folk standing in front of me talking and so on – how would in many ways my ‘dream gig’ fare?

Well to be honest, it was the only part of a fantastic evening which put a slight dampner on things. When you are listening to pastoral, ethereal melodies with soaring vocals, sitting down doesn’t seem that incongrous and is even quite pleasant. When they play a poppier or more psychedelic number, it lends a vaguely sterile and anodyne air to proceedings. In fairness to the Glasgow punters, they were on their feet strutting their stuff on a few occasions, although mainly to songs like Ooh La La from Supernature or Strict Machine from Black Cherry, with a huge industrial machine pump going up and down on the screen behind them. Nothing from the latest album Seventh Tree or indeed their first Felt Mountain seemed to float their boat in quite the same way, which was strange as my hubby and I were blown away by the newer stuff in particular.

These really are a band and singer and the top of the their game. Alison’s voice sounded amazing throughout. They opened with a tremendous triple-whammy – Brown Paper Bag from Felt Mountain, A&E from Seventh Tree and then Utopia from Felt Mountain. It is at this stage that I really have to mention the visual impact of the band and in particular the images projected behind them while they played. For a start, the stage is decorated with fairy lights, bunting and a huge maypole-type thingie with antlers on top which throws its slightly sinister shape onto the screen behind depending on the lighting. The band come on dressed entirely in white with the two female musician/backing singers barefoot. Alison herself is also barefoot and in a floaty cape number made of what looks like pink nightie-fabric with pompoms. There is great excitement from males at the front whenever she lifts her arms but it soon becomes clear that there are matching pink-nightie material shorts underneath. When the chorus of Utopia kicks in the projected image becomes the lights of sped up traffic in a city at night, flashing beat for beat in time with the music and the impact of this combined with the music really swept me away. Creative lighting along with visual images on screen were used to great effect throughout.

Other highlights for me were Some People and Happiness, and I found Little Bird with its amazing psychedelic light show properly spine-tingling. I believe the Frappmeisters will be playing Connect later in the summer and if you get the chance to see them you must. Even given the restrictions of the venue, tonight they were genuinely uplifting. Unmissable.

Filed under: gigs Tagged: | a and e, allison goldfrapp, concerts, Goldfrapp, Live, music, rock and roll, shows