MUSIC: Enter Shikari : Camden Roundhouse - 10/10/09 (Live)

For those of you who may not have been to a gig, it starts off with one or two support bands playing before the main act. Whilst at most gigs, crowds grin and bite their tongue if a support band isn’t to their taste, Enter Shikari fans haven’t got that ability within them apparently. True Tiger were the victim of an onslaught that came from the crowd. Glowsticks were encouraged to be thrown, but as the crowd began jeering and demanding the next support act whilst sticking their fingers up at the band, you couldn’t help but feel sorry for True Tiger – my hat goes off to them for sticking it out and finishing their set, yet this incident left me a bit apprehensive for how the night would turn out.

It turns out I needn’t have worried, the crowd was relatively calm, which was unusual as they should have been going mental! The music is untouchable and Enter Shikari have a fantastic ability to perform perfectly live, however the live presence just didn’t seem to be there. Some would say this is due to their new album ‘Common Dreads’ which seems to be stepping away from the Metalcore of their ‘Take to the Skies’ debut, however the new songs slide in perfectly adjacent with the old songs, especially Zzzonked which was astounding. It’s also unfair to say that the band aren’t trying, they put their all into playing their songs live as they obviously did when writing them, with the band being political in their messages. There just didn’t seem to be anything particularly special about the performance.

I was quite happy later on then to be informed by a fan that this wasn’t one of their best gigs, she in fact put it that this was one of the worst out of the tens of times she has seen them. Maybe they had a bad night in Camden, maybe this could have been due to the fact they’re friends with True Tiger who the crowd had thrown so much abuse at. Hopefully opportunity will rise for me to see Enter Shikari again and see them do as good as I’ve been told they can, I will just have to wait until then.

***

MUSIC: Paolo Nutini : Nottingham Rock City - 28/09/09 (Live)

Paolo Nutini is only at the tender age of 22, yet when he walks casually onto the stage as his band The Vipers play there is no fragility showing, just pure love. Love for music.

There is something strange about his persona, he does not seem to be the most confident person in music – hardly talking to the audience at all within the hour and a half set, yet on the other hand when he’s singing, confidence seems to ooze out of him leaving the audience mesmerized. His pure passion for what he is doing is contagious; people who may not have been the greatest fan of Paolo before the gig were leaving as in love with his music as he is.

His show itself would not be out of place in a jazz club, playing mainly songs off his latest album ‘Sunny Side Up’ or classic tracks reworked to sound like his new album, the rhythm is intensely catchy. You can see his appeal as the audience are embraced by the songs but the thing that is most fascinating as you look around the audience is the total variety of people. You have people from all works of life, young and old, those that listen to Radio One and those that listen to Radio Two – all coming together because Paolo’s songs cannot fail to connect with you; they preach messages of love and happiness which touches everyone who listens to the lyrics.

As his hand moves along with the music and Paolo crouches over the microphone, you can see he is in his own little world, and with a live performance like this - what a nice little world it must be.

*****