Mew – Fleece & Firkin – Sunday 23rd October 2005Comments Off
m posted in General moans, Music on November 9th, 2005
Here’s the slightly (and deliberately) formulaic review I wrote for our local listings mag, but which missed the deadline. I’ll admit it’s not brilliant, but it’s better than some of the crap they print on a weekly basis. For added weblog gratification, click on the links to hear live versions of a couple of the songs (recorded at another gig).
The disembodied head of J Mascis, cat violinists, baboon cellists and stampeding giraffes. No, this is not the description of an evening in Pete Doherty’s heavily dusted brain; this is the enchanting world of Danish indie-prog elves, Mew. This youthful five-piece from Copenhagen are already on their fourth album, though it’s only the second to be released in the UK.
Tonight’s set consists of almost equal parts “Frengers” and “…and the glass-handed kites”; their two UK-released albums. Songs from the former album (such as the eclectic “Am I wry? No” and the re-worked “156″) go down especially well with the sell-out Fleece crowd, while the newer, heavier, proggier songs (”Special”, “Apocalypso”, “Zookeeper’s Boy”) are met initially with a more guarded welcome.
Singer Jonas Bjerre looks and sounds like a choirboy, and his acrobatic singing is often the only thing that holds the multitude of time-signature and tempo changes together. It’s an oddly pleasing mixture of Arcade Fire, Rush and Muse, with added Danish charm and a contemporary crispness.
What of the peculiar imagery? Well, in a previous life, Mew were students of film-making. They’ve incorporated those skills into their set, by projecting home-made films onto the stage throughout the show. Unrepresentative current single, “Why are you looking so grave?” features the voice of Dinosaur Jr’s J Mascis. So, naturally, the band filmed him and incorporated his image into their dreamy, psychedelic picture show. Along with various exotic, musically talented animals.
After gratefully applauding the crowd, Mew close the evening with hypnotic epic, “Comforting Sounds”. It’s a song which gently plods along, picking up more instrumentation and volume, until it explodes in a deafening chord, 10 minutes after the song began. The mesmerised crowd make their way out onto the street, all destined to dream of ostriches, baboons and a rabbit using his ears as wings while he blows through a trumpet.
It wasn’t a normal night at the Fleece.
