22 February 2007 (gig)
25 February 2007
The NME Indie Rave Tour was brought to an end last night with a riotous evening at the Hammersmith Palais. Call it new wave, indie rave or whatever you damn like, if it’s this fun no-one really cares what it’s pigeon-holed as.
New Young Pony Club were first up and it is a sign of their growing stature that the venue was mostly full for their set despite the 7pm stage time. Frontwoman Ty Bulmer mocked the NME Rock Tour that runs alongside its indie rave incarnation and said that new wave was the future. 'New times, new excitement,' she matter of factly told the glow-stick kids. Impending single The Bomb garnered a warm reception and when a band this cocksure and important are first on the bill, you know you are in for a good night.
The Sunshine Underground swaggered on to the stage next to a gut-wrenching bassline, before powering through an energetic set including new single Borders. Lead singer Craig Wellington, who must have been sweating buckets in his football casual jacket, incited the crowd in to pogoing frenzy and felt very much like the spokesman for the evening, a feeling cemented when he led the evening’s encore. But more of that later. The whole evening just felt so much more fun than seeing certain rock acts who take themselves too seriously, and this was probably best encapsulated by Wellington pushing over his cowbell rack on his way off the stage.
The penultimate act of the night were Brazilian funsters CSS who entered the fray sporting what looked like burkhas. They kicked off with a version of CSS Suxxx laced with 2 Unlimited’s No Limit. Knowing glances were exchanged among the older heads against a backdrop or probable puzzlement to the kids at the front. Lead singer Lovefoxxx introduced Alcohol with an ode to how much she loved it and a couple of thousand gig-goers heartily agreed.
If the evening had been enjoyable up to this point, things were about to go stratospheric. Klaxons kicked off their set with classic rave standard The Bouncer, then ensured there wasn’t a single soul standing still by launching into Atlantis to Interzone. The siren sounding at the beginning of the track acted as an invitation for a number of crowd surfers to head for the stage over the top. A disappointingly flat rendition of Golden Skans didn’t sate the audience’s appetite and Majick was another sweaty singalong highlight.
Proceedings were brought to a suitably grand end when all four bands joined forces for a encore that included the opening track of Myths of the Near Future, Two Receivers, and the Klaxons’ cover of mid-Nineties dance classic It’s Not Over Yet before a brief acappela rendition of Hey Jude.
After frequenting the smaller stages of last year’s festivals, expect all these bands to have a much larger part to play this year and Klaxons to steal the hearts of many more old ravers before they are done.
