It's been five years since the momentous meeting of Transgressive Records founders Tim Dellow and Toby L at a Bloc Party gig, and to celebrate they're putting on a series of London gigs including headline slots from Foals and Johnny Flynn. Tonight's opening party at Heaven sees the return of post-punk revivalists Young Knives, whose setlist has been determined by fans' online votes.
Within the first few beats of opener 'Up All Night', the crowd is air-punching and pogo-ing like mad and it feels like our beloved Ashby de la Zouch boys have never been away. The only noticeable difference is that they appear to have ditched their trademark tweed in favour of office wear; frontman Henry Dartnell performs his frantic guitar riffs whilst dressed like Mark from Peep Show. 'I haven't been out of the house for a while,' he declares. 'This is exciting, isn't it? Welcome to the fifth anniversary of Transgressive, a rather hit-and-miss record label. I like a few of the bands.' He's a funny guy, that Henry.
Photo Credit: Simon Fernandez
The trio then plays 'Counters', which provokes some rather bizarre hugging-pogo-ing from a male couple in the crowd. It kind of reminds me of a tandem, only instead of a bicycle, it's a pogo stick. The band continues to please the crowd with energetic performances of 'Guess The Baby's Weight' and 'Loughborough Suicide'.
And then the inevitable happens. A rather over-excited audience member screams out, 'Hot Summer!' I guess this kind of behaviour is to be expected really. 'Yes, we're doing all the hits. There's no need to shout them out,' replies Henry. 'You didn't pick any from the forthcoming third album though. We're playing 10 songs from the 12 people who voted, plus a couple of new tracks for shits and giggles.'
Sure enough, 'Turn Tail' is followed by new song 'Sister Frideswide', which is accompanied by some uncouth, out-of-sync pogo-ing from our tandem couple, whilst 'Here Comes The Rumour Mill' incites some unmistakable, albeit subtle moshing. They then play 'Worcestershire Madman', 'another crazy B-side that some geek asked for', before launching straight into hit single 'Terra Firma'.
Proceedings are momentarily held up whilst bassist Thomas, AKA The House of Lords, (who is also sporting a particularly fetching shirt and tie combo which says 'IT nerd' rather than 'dedicated JLB employee') complains about having sweat in his eye. 'It's really stinging,' he moans. His brother Henry decides that this is probably the worst story they've ever told on stage, before introducing the other new song, 'Everything Falls Into Place'.
Photo Credit: Simon Fernandez
Henry utters a quick word of thanks to the crowd for patiently enduring the newbie, before launching into what everyone's been waiting for. The opening guitar line of 'Weekends And Bleak Days (Hot Summer)' incites utter mayhem on the dance floor; there's beer flying everywhere, the pogo-ing reaches its climax and the crowd is singing back every single word.
'This is going to be our last song,' announces Henry, before shamelessly admitting what every headliner arrogantly thinks but never actually says: '...apart from the encore.' And true to his word, after performing 'Current Of The River' and leaving the stage, they reappear to raucous applause and loyal chants of 'We want more!' 'I feel all famous again,' Henry declares. 'I love being famous.' And with the crowd's wholeheartedly adoring response to encore 'She's Attracted To', it's easy to see why.
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