Photo by Gaelle_Beri
Originally published in the May issue of The Fly
During ‘Lasso’, the third song this evening, the whole crowd is bellowing, “Where would you go with a lasso?” along with Phoenix’s rather visually pleasing frontman Thomas Mars. It’s nonsense of the most quintessentially vague pop kind, but he could be leading a chorus of the East Whitby bowling green fixtures and the reception would be just as ebullient. And deservedly so too – whilst on record, the songs from ‘Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix’ shimmy within precisely chic lines, live, they’re a viscerally adventurous proposition. The introduction of opener ‘Lisztomania’ hangs from Eno-like tenterhooks with the band silhouetted behind a huge white curtain, the first of many instances of merciless, permissibly indulgent teasing exacted this evening. ‘Run Run Run’ is all creeping synths and climax-evading precipices until a post-chorus breakdown that makes Hudson Mohawke’s support slot make perfect sense – the bass goes off like a ferocious artillery of canons, whilst Mars swings around the stage, thwacking his mic stand down with his microphone like Babe Ruth going for a home run. ‘Love Like A Sunset’ initially strains like a Ferrari locked in first gear before Christian and Laurent indulge in a goading exchange of notes that builds tension befitting of the brink of nuclear warfare. They finally allow themselves that climactic explosion on ‘1901’, with Thomas taking a thoroughly deserved victory lap around the shoulders of the crowd. Suddenly the only thing that makes no sense is why the shitting crikey they’re not yet one of the biggest bands in the world. With shows like this, they certainly should be.
