Looking back over the colourful mayhem which ensued, it's easy to forget that the night began with the rather excellent support band Cats In Paris. The Manchester-based trio dished out a frenetic set; Michael J Watson dashed between keyboards and violin on songs about vampires, serial killers and traditional English cookery, all to a colourful video backdrop. Great fun, and the perfect mood-setter for what was to follow.
Whilst on record False Priest falls short of its two illustrious predecessors, there was never any doubt that the songs would translate into a whole barrel of fun in a live setting, and so it proved. Kevin Barnes, dolled up in a skirt, bandana and a technicolour dream-coat, was given free reign to prance around the enormous Koko stage and his army of musicians, immaculately clad out in white. Amongst a set almost exclusively comprising material from Hissing Fauna... onwards, the new songs found their natural home; Like A Tourist aspired to hit the R'n'B heights it never quite reached on False Priest, thanks to its throbbing basslines and diva chorus , whilst our Riotous Defects (known to one and all as Crazy Girl) cemented itself as a firm fan singalong favourite. The one disappointment? No Janelle Monae; following on from her Jools Holland appearance the previous night, I could have put money on her duetting with Barnes on Enemy Gene, but it was sadly not to be.
Amidst it all, Barnes et al were constantly molested by the usual (for want of a better word) array of costumed fiends, including gun-toting fish-robots, silver-winged creatures and crazed men in blood-stained strait jackets (who on freeing themselves confirmed that the lunatics truly had taken over the asylum). The crowd too were not immune to molestations, with frequent invasions from masked misfits and band alike; one such moment of indulgence during She's A Rejector gave Barnes sufficient time to drape a silver veil over himself and put a noose around his neck, appropriately morbid attire for the set's sole downer Casualty Of You, before immediately bouncing back with Heimdalsgate Like A Promethean Curse. The main set closed in spectacular fashion with an explosion of streamers and confetti fired from the palms of Barnes' hands.
Once a guy in a pig mask and another guy in a blonde wig had roused the crowd into a frenzy, the band returned with the now-obligatory encore of The Past Is A Grotesque Animal. Officially recognised (well, by me) as one of the 10 or 15 greatest songs of modern indie, an intense Barnes actually played it straight (for once), fixated to the mic over the song's 12 stormy minutes, before throwing a fit in the middle of the stage. In short, a gay time was had by all, quite literally; the sight of Kevin Barnes singing "we can do it softcore if you want/but you should know I take it both ways" over a video backdrop of male body-builders may have scarred me for life.
I've included more pics than I usually would for these things; it was the only way to do an Of Montreal gig any justice.
No comments:
Post a Comment