Wednesday, May 07, 2008

elbow triumphant! (my Guy...!)

It was a little over a week ago when Hubby and I had a most delightful evening out with the Manchester UK band known as elbow. He had seen them open for Doves (I was sick that night) and said they “blew Doves off the stage.” I had seen the band do a short set at the CMJ daystage and watched another truncated show on a video screen later that night when the club they were playing was overcrowded.

This band has been around for many years, but has had a different label for nearly every one of its previous albums – Asleep in the Back, Cast of Thousands, Leaders of the Free World – and never got the traction it needed to break the American market.
Now, finally, the band has released an album, The Seldom Seen Kid, on a US major (Geffen) that appears willing and able to support a proper tour, and we were thoroughly psyched to see elbow do a full headliner set and to see it together. (This is a very romantic band.)

The show was a triumph on all counts. The venue – the Historic Sixth and I Synagogue – is a jewel. The audience sits in the pews of the sanctuary under a gorgeous domed roof while the musicians perform on the raised….altar? (I was rasied Catholic, so I don’t know if that’s the proper word). And any concerns we had about the sound were knocked out by the first number. We heard it all just fine.

The opening act was Jessca Hoop, a woman with that little bit of quirky edge that raises her above the usual singer/songwriter crowd. I knew one song from exposure on KCRW’s “Morning Becomes Eclectic” show (available via Internet stream every weekday from noon-3 EST) so I was pleased to get a chance to hear the rest.


Hoop wore an old-fashioned long print dress, the new hip matron look, and was barefoot. Her patter with the audience was a tad arch, but with a sense of humor to it, too. Her guitar playing stumbled some, but her voice and songs were intriguing and strong. Her set was maybe a half-dozen songs, and the audience was respectful-to-enthusiastic. She lingered in the small lobby during intermission and we were going to buy her CD (she and elbow were selling all their albums for a kind $10 each) but hers sold out before we got to the table.

And then came the main event. In trying to think of a single word to describe it, I decided on “majestic.”

Instead of simply walking onto the stage, the band strode down the center aisle, leader Guy Garvey being one of a few members carrying horns. Taking the stage, they opened with the beautiful blare of “Starlings” from the new CD. The audience’s ovation reflected hubby and my own sincere joy in finally getting to hear the band. The applause after every song was sustained and loud, as if we were trying to convey to the group our congratulations that they might finally break through and our delight in tasting victory with them.

Garvey – a burly, bearded man with the stature of a melancholy literature professor (the kind all the graduate student girls fall in love with and want to save) was in fine form. His voice soared to choirboy Kyrie heights with a rough vulnerability that resonates at the midpoint between Bono and The Blue Nile’s Paul Buchanan. And he seemed as happy to be with us as we were to be with him, frequently commenting on the beauty of the venue and the strength of the audience’s response. He taught us all the anthemic chorus of “One Day Like This” and sang the repeating coda of “Newborn” with an intensity that brought the audience cheers to a new decibel, and generally endeared himself all around with amusing asides and little stories between songs.

We left with big smiles and full hearts. A great night out.

As I type, with 92% of the vote in, Indiana is still too close to call. Unbelievable!

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