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Gig review: The Divine Comedy @ the Olympia Theatre

Review Snapshot: The Neil Hannon Show rolls into town for the final date in a week-long Irish tour with double-bass and accordion in tow.

The CLUAS Verdict? 8 out of 10

Before the show nobody was quite sure what to expect from Neil Hannon and his newly, slimmed-down Divine Comedy; it had only been a few months since a new album, Absent Friends, so nobody could accurately predict whether the setlist was going to comprise material largely derived thereof or whether this week-long, six-venue Irish tour could almost be classed as a Greatest Hits exercise.

Sean Needham provided much-appreciated opening duties for the assembling crowd, particularly pleasing and earnest with ‘When Will We Be One’, ‘Life Goes On ‘and the hugely amusing B-Side ‘Single Blues’ in his Damien Rice meets Christy Dignam style, and well he deserved to flog a few copies of his recent ‘Loosely Based On A True Story’ opus after the show to a crowd who seemed to warm to his guitar-assisted sincerity and passion.

Having been sufficiently warmed up by Needham the crowd turned to the main act who punctually took stage to an enthusiastic reception by the almost-packed Olympia. And so to the music… and still nobody was sure of what exactly to expect, especially given the curious instrument mix chosen: double-bass and accordion accompanying Hannon’s guitar and occasional piano. And the start, the first two tracks from Absent Friends (as stylistically proficient and entertaining as ‘Come Home Billy Byrd (International Business Traveller)’ was), still left the crowd none the wiser as to the band’s motive. They didn’t have to wait much longer to find out – next came ‘Your Daddy’s Car’, greeted with telling applause – and the audience began to relax.

Hannon himself was in flying form, cheery and cracking well-received one-liners. Having taken to the stage with a pint of stout (“I’d like to thank Guinness… for this pint… and for the forthcoming sponsorship deal“) instructed the crowd not to hesitate heckling. Fantastic idea, because it was through this dialogue that the crowd really began to thoroughly enjoy the occasion as well as just the music; and in terms of audience participation Hannon scored highly for an admittedly Graham Norton-inspired routine whereby everyone was made stand, and then allowed to sit whenever they owned a Divine Comedy album named by him – culminating in the lines, “You, madam, are you enjoying yourself?… Great, I’m delighted, now tomorrow buy one of the f**king records, ok?“. Also well-received was the offer to share Hannon’s second pint, which he rescinded because “I’m not Jesus… actually, wouldn’t it be great if I WAS Jesus? …My Dad would be so proud of me.”

Musically the performance was as solid and consistent as any of the band’s eight albums; ‘National Express’ bringing the seated crowd to their feet and singing the chorus, ‘The Happy Goth’ causing some perhaps unusual light-heartedness in the audience, ‘Everybody Knows (Except You)’ earning great affection and – perhaps surprisingly but definitely pulled off – Queen of the Stone age’s ‘No One Knows’, led by Hannon’s crashing piano. The setlist ultimately became dispersed with tracks from Absent Friends (none of which really seemed to cause as much enthusiasm as ‘Come Home…’) sandwiching other favourites like ‘Becoming More Like Alfie’, the rousing ‘National Express’, ‘Songs Of Love’ and ‘My Lovely Horse’, and the closing ‘Tonight We Fly’. As an encore the band chose breakthrough single ‘Something For The Weekend’ (“The chord that launched a career”), again bringing the crowd singing to their feet and, fittingly, their last single, ‘Absent Friends’, capping a great performance that earned the Divine Comedy trio much admiration on the night.

Perhaps the only gripe about the night was that the set lacked some of the band’s other, more radio-friendly singles like ‘Generation Sex’, ‘The Pop Singer’s Fear Of The Pollen Count’ and ‘The Frog Princess’, but this was only a minor glitch in retrospect and the newer material offered was still appreciatively lapped up. And for entertainment value – hell, if only for ‘My Lovely Horse’, Hannon & Co definitely earned their douze points.

Ten Great Music Videos: Radiohead – ‘Just’

as part of Cluas’s ten best videos of all time feature.

Radiohead – ‘Just’
Taken from the band’s 1995 offering, The Bends, it’s fair to say that this video did as much as the music in bringing Radiohead’s new blends to the masses. As the band watch the street below a man walking by decides to lie on the path – for reasons unbeknown to anyone else. Despite pleas by passers-by for him to rise – all of this dialogue between the people in the video is subtitled – the man stays where he is. After consistent pressure the man agrees to tell the crowd that has by now assembled around him, why it is that he’s lying on the pavement. At this point the subtitles end while the man explains his reason, and as he finishes the picture blackens. A few seconds later it returns with the whole crowd lying on the pavement alongside him. When questioned about what the man says, Thom Yorke said it possibly has something to do with a number, but that the exact words would never be known to the general public. Shame, really – I was about to brush the dust off my walking shoes… (submitted by Gav Reilly)

Top 5: Irish Albums of All Time

Act: Damien Rice
Album: ‘O’
Overlooked initially upon its 2002 release, O is a true success story of romantic proportions. Taking Ireland, the UK, Europe and now the US by storm, largely through word-of-mouth, it’s the stuff of legend. Gifted musician fronts Next Big Thing (Juniper), leaves on verge of greatness, emigrates to continental Europe to busk and grow vegetables, returns to Celbridge and home-makes an album remarkable for its originality. Heavily featuring the silky delectable vocals of Lisa Hannigan and bowing of cellist Vyvienne Long, O is packed with luscious melodies, real emotion and fantastic songs.

Act: Bell X1
Album: ‘Neither Am I’
Picture the scene – band on verge of stardom, singer leaves, cue immediate questioning about future. Bell x1 (formerly Juniper) relax, ponder their options, and with Paul Noonan at the vocal helm they produce a cracking debut. From the laidback groove of Godsong, to the distortion-laid angst of Man On Mir, and through to the almost jazz stylings of Face, Neither Am I is an absorbing debut and was worth the wait after the collapse of Juniper.

Act: U2
Album: ‘The Joshua Tree’
One word: masterpiece. Preceded by the promising The Unforgettable Fire and followed by the disappointing Rattle and Hum, The Joshua tree was quite possibly the best album of the entire 1980’s, deservedly won the Grammy for the Best Album of 1987, and was crammed full of singles that kids today still know – Where The streets Have No Name, I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For and With Or Without You. The Joshua Tree is probably home to U2’s best non-single ever too, One Tree Hill, which wasn’t singled because it would require excessive playing which would make Bono – and probably the rest of us – cry. Pure gold.

Act: U2
Album: ‘All That You Can’t Leave Behind’
It had been a while coming – Pop and Zoo had been a bit egotistical in many people’s eyes, but in 2001 U2 decided, in Bono’s own words, to re-apply for the job of the world’s biggest band. And bloody hell, did they give it a good whack. With Beautiful Day they soared, with Stuck In A Moment… they went mellow (we blame Salman Rushdie) and with the reworked Walk On they strike the chords that only they know. The world’s biggest band? After this… probably.

Act: The Frames
Album: ‘Fitzcarraldo’
Glenn Hansard’s showcase. After the commercial embarrassment of Another Love Song (pulled soon after release), tracks like Angel At My Table, the title track and the sublime Relevate. This is not the type of music you forget easily – the whispered lines on Relevate cling for hours afterwards and if you can imagine how some of these sound live… whoa. You’ll get far more than 45 minutes out of this; buy now before you die.

Album review: Jamie Cullum – Twentysomething

A few things to point out first: (a) This is not a jazz album in the unapproachable sense – there are Jimi Hendrix and Jeff Buckley covers here; (b) This is not some pet project funded by BBC’s Michael Parkinson for some upstart he happens to like. This is a bona fide listenable and enjoyable opus.

Jamie Cullum is not your typical jazz pianist or singer. For one, he’s far younger than mid-thirties, as suggested by the album’s title. For another, he straddles genres for fun – this is certainly not a jazz-only album. And the end result is surprisingly great.

Opening with a Norah Jones-esque ‘What A Difference A Day Made’, Cullum lilts in an accented twang which is fast becoming trademark. Proceeding through a fantastically ornamented ‘Singin’ In The Rain’, Cullum establishes his clear knack for arrangements. He proves his promising song writing calibre with the title track, an anthem for any 21st Century post-teenager. “Don’t make me live for my Friday nights / drinking 8 pints and getting in fights“, it could almost be a lyric by The Streets. And it’s got a catchy piano riff to boot. Again it’s not jazz in the traditional sense, it’s just an indie song with a jazzy middle-section and some piano ornamentation.

Another highlight is ‘I Could Have Danced All Night’, opening with Cullum singing the bassline before the entry of groovy percussion. ‘All At Sea’ opens with a warm piano sound and has some smooth harmonic interludes, and ‘Next Year, Baby’ could easily have been called New Year’s Resolutions for Dummies
– but 1 minute 47 seconds in, the samba edge enters in and your foot starts tapping involuntarily.

In terms of other covers, ‘I Get A Kick Out Of You’ is well-worked – here is a man who can swing old-style too. When he goes all Jimi Hendrix on his ‘Wind Cries Mary’, you’re obliged to admit that Cullum’s voice couldn’t be more suitable. ‘Lover, You Should Have Come Over’, from Jeff Buckley’s Grace, is a similar interpretation to the original but you find yourself willing him to try and jump that extra octave at the end of the chorus. Still, it’s another song that otherwise fits his voice magnificently.

After the last chords and sax fade away from ‘Next Year, Baby’, bringing the work to a close, you will want to go back and listen to the title track again. And then you won’t bother to turn the CD off again either. You will listen and you will like.

A promising debut from a bright young twenty something. Definitely worth investigation.

Album review: Radiohead – Hail to the Thief

Ed O’Brien, Radiohead perpetual nice-guy guitarist, reckons if his band were a football team, they’d be Man United and not Real Madrid, as Coldplay’s Chris Martin thinks. If he’s right, then, just as the Red Devils were written off and then returned with a bang (albeit unconvincingly) to regain Champions status, so Radiohead will soon be back on the throne as High Imperial Sorcerers of Rock. Having misplaced their crown on the last few attempts, this is a return to the Brit Pop days. Kind of?

The first thing you notice about ‘Hail to the Thief’ is the sleeve. The cover and first seven pages are merely random words (‘Enforced’ sits beside ‘collision’ and ‘ballistic’ in meaningless babble). The rest of the sleeve – which features lyrics – a first for Radiohead since the glory days of 1997’s ‘OK Computer’ – has a Sgt Pepper feel to it (note that if the Beatles were still active, they’d be Radiohead’s Parlophone label-mates). Also thought-provoking is that each track is given a bracketed pseudonym.

‘Hail To The Thief’ begins with the daunting ‘2+2=5’, a track with a tangible ‘Knives Out’ vibe. “Are you such a dreamer / to pull the world to rights?” Immediately you sense a hidden political agenda. The chords seem ad hoc and unplanned but two minutes in the song launches into a violent, squealing assault. The album’s title being roared over it affirms the political sway (it refers to George W Bush). It is followed by the more sombre ‘Sit Down, Stand Up’ whose lyrics seem vague (“We can wipe you out at any time“), and again the ‘drums’ (more of an overused sample of something akin to Underworld) build tension as Yorke wails “The Raindrops” a few dozen times. At the end it almost sounds like it’s borrowing some Apollo 440. This is a consistent theme throughout the album; there’s a vague hint of recalling music of the last five years (Noel Gallagher musical cat-burglary springs to mind) but Radiohead are not so blatant and probably don’t even realise they’re doing it. The similarities are so slight but definite.

‘Sail To The Moon’ is a piano wannabe-ballad but fails due to the return of the unpredictable chords. Maybe they have been listening to other music during their hiatus, but nobody’s been sneaking a listen to Coldplay. The lyric goes “Maybe You’ll be President, but know right from wrong / or in the flood you’ll build an ark and sail us to the moon“. Maybe now you know where Yorke’s son Noah got his name. ‘Backdrifts’ returns to the ‘Sit Down, Stand Up’ model of a drum sample with vague lyrics and looping, sombre monophonic guitar – like a lot of Amnesiac.

‘Go To Sleep’ picks up where the opener left off, ?la ‘Knives Out’. There is a definite sense though that Radiohead can produce ear-pleasing music. “Over my dead body,” the lyric repeats at the opening. And for a completely inexplicable reason, it’s pleasing to hear. If the band had never created ‘The Bends’ or ‘OK Computer’ this would probably be their best stuff.

‘Where I End and You Begin’ sounds like? something else. There’s a definite feeling of d?a-heard about it. It’s one of those 90’s songs that everyone knows but nobody can place (possibly Hootie and the Blowfish?). Although discordal, it too is also strangely pleasing to hear. Radiohead have begun to get into gear and the album begins to grow on you. You realise for the first time that there are actual songs here you will want to play again.

‘We Suck Young Blood’ is not to be approached with a comic anticipation. Handclaps (sic!) are put in at the end of each line. A hybrid of Amnesiac duo ‘Life In A Glasshouse’ and ‘Pyramid Song’, it’s bloody well haunting. The vocal line hangs. “Are you sweet? / Are your fresh? / Are you strung up by the wrists?” The middle section contains the most off-putting vocal yelps on any Radiohead track yet, but as a whole? well, suffice it to say that you wouldn’t want to meet its personification in a dark alley.

With ‘The Gloaming’ you sense Radiohead want to prove a point – “Murderers, you’re murderers / we are not the same as you” – but the music unfortunately doesn’t reciprocate – another overused percussion to blame. Next up is the album’s first single ‘There There’ which, although dark, is the most positive Radiohead single since 1997. It’s tuneful and its heavy percussion is a damn good antidote to an S Club Juniors or Girls Aloud overdose. It’s a dense track, and borrows from ‘Climbing Up The Walls’ in its vocal sense of inescapability (“Why so green and lonely? Heaven sent you to me“).

‘I Will’ is a hymn of sorts, dedicated to those accidentally killed during both Gulf Wars but doesn’t manage to sound too glorious. There’s a vibe similar to that from ‘The Lake Isle of Innisfree’ with the opening lines “I will / Lay me down / In a bunker / underground“. You can’t quite place the influences but you know they’re there – another consistent theme. The next track, ‘A Punch-up At A Wedding’, demonstrates this beautifully. Another bass line that you know you’ve heard before. But what the hell is it? It could just have easily been from a later All Saints track. The words ‘punch-up’ at the end get added venom from Yorke’s well-acted rage.

The title of the next track, ‘Myxomatosis’, suggests a parody, but a parody this is not. This is good stuff that would have fitted in quite brilliantly on Kid A. The twin octaved bass lines roll continuously through the track (the word ‘song’ doesn’t feel right talking about this album). The lyrics evoke a non-existent Bagpuss story, catapulted into the world of Grand Theft Auto. ‘Scatterbrain’, the penultimate track, maintains a nice guitar arpeggio unheard of since ‘Street Spirit…’. For a second you think they’ve cracked it and gone back to the glory days, but the chords move differently while still maintaining a warmth and steadiness that’s welcoming after the shaky, experimental opening of the first few tracks.

The finale, ‘A Wolf At The Door’, is a violent lyrical assault. Thom, for once, doesn’t let lyrics hang. It’s the closest Radiohead will ever get to a rap but it’s not a rap. It’s just a non-stop barrage of sensible gibberish. “?flip the lid out pops the cracker smacks you in the head knifes you in the neck“. It’s all connected and relates to what’s come before but still doesn’t quite hold a plot. The chorus maintains the barrage but holds an independent plot. “I keep the wolf from the door but he calls me up / calls me up on the phone, tells me all the ways that he’s gonna mess me up / steal all my children if I don’t pay the ransom / & I’ll never see them again if I squeal to the cops“. The chords add to the glory – it’s definitely a grower and seems a contender for second single.

At the end, a point begins to dawn on you. This is a well-thought out and diverse offering and if the band as a whole were willing to put the Kid A / Amnesiac sessions behind them then – make no mistake – this would be a classic of The Bends and OK Computer’s stature. As it is, it’s a cracking attempt and you feel by the end that you can see which parts of the album the ‘sunshine’ – that the band felt they’d experienced for the first time in five years – have influenced. A little more of a break and a masterpiece is on the cards.

Above all there is definitely the message that Radiohead are back and, given the patience, they will do even better.