There’s a slightly manic urgency about it, as if people aren’t just enjoying themselves but have realised that the chances of things continuing like this are pretty slim: they have to enjoy it while they can. In fact, it’s hard not to feel that the mood in the venue weirdly recalls that at the gigs that took place immediately before lockdown. But picking nits feels churlish in such an exuberant atmosphere. Their attempts to interpolate Space & Time with the Velvet Underground’s I’m Waiting for the Man is perhaps a step too far – the latter really isn’t a song that suits Rowsell’s carefully enunciated vocal style and Wolf Alice don’t seem like they spend their spare time being threatened by pimps while trying to score heroin in Harlem. Wolf Alice are an English rock band from London, England. Singer Ellie Rowsell doesn’t say much but a disbelieving grin keeps creeping across her face, and there’s something fabulously surplus-to-requirements about guitarist Joff Oddie encouraging the audience to sing along or bassist Theo Ellis’s rousing suggestion that they “go fucking mental”.įor the most part, though, they just play, ripping through Bros and Don’t Delete the Kisses, turning the grungey Moaning Lisa Smile into a vast epic. The band seem justifiably taken aback by quite how vociferous the response is. But the strength of Lipstick on the Glass’s Abba-esque melody shines through, as do Feeling Myself’s rousing surges from understated verses to a soaring chorus strafed with echoing, effects-heavy guitar. Some of the subtleties get lost in the general bedlam: the punky yelp of Play the Greatest Hits fares substantially better that the lengthy, delicate opening of The Last Man on Earth, which you literally can’t hear over the delighted racket made by the audience. Wolf Alice are nominated for five awards at this year’s BandLab NME Awards 2022, including Best Album In The World and Best Album By A UK Artist for ‘Blue Weekend’, Best Festival Headliner. The songs from Blue Weekend are fantastic, a confident step forward from those on its predecessors. The sound of people singing along is every bit as deafening for the songs they’ve never played live before as it is for their biggest hits, while Safe from Heartbreak (If You Never Fall In Love) provokes an outbreak of synchronised arm-waving, which fits the song’s tempo if not its bitter mood (“You fucked with my feelings”). It should be a risky move, but the crowd are delirious and the album came out a month ago: long enough for their fans to have memorised every word.
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