Night and Day 26/01/06

Right. Finally getting round to writing something about Liam’s amazing, sweaty, touching, rocking, SELL-OUT gig at the Night and Day last night. I was also able to take some original pics for the first time and they’re included here. Enjoy them, copy them, lick them for all I care.









First to the support acts. Wandering onto stage came wannabe Top Man model Damon Valentine with a haircut so styled he could easily be in McFly. His music, however, was not a patch on the teenage pop phenomena. Nice voice, bad rhymes but ten points for emoting his way through his sub-Stain’d power ballads. Definitely NOT one to watch.











Which, by a convenient coincidence, is absolutely NOT something that can be said about six-piece Lisa Brown. Equal parts Arcade Fire, Elbow, Hope of the States and Sigur Ros they absolutely blew my metaphorical socks off. Which is quite a feat. I love it when bands are clearly LOVING what they are doing and their enthusiasm definitely was rubbing off on the (rapidly) warming-up crowd. Big sound. Big smiles. Big future.







To the main event. The Night and Day is already looking like a stage to small to contain the Slowdown Family (in more ways than one). I think the decision to push Play-Everything Pete to the back was a mistake. Especially considering he plays such a big part in creating the band’s sound. I am also unclear as to what the new guitarist actually does – other than pretending to be Albert Hammond Jr.










Liam seemed enormously up for it though and took to his set with usual gusto. The set covered all the bases. Old stuff like Road Signs and Red Lights and Unititled (now called – Is this Love?) sounded great in with newies like the Springsteen-esque Mourners of St Pauls. Then, in a set already sounded like a best of, he rattled through Paperboats, I Woke Up, She Painted Pictures and If Tonight I Could Only Sleep. One word – special. They’ll talk about these gigs in the annals of pop history. You just see if they don’t. Roll on next Thurday!