Saturday, February 16, 2008
You love Sons and Daughters
First thing's first, Sons and Daughters' new album, This Gift, is astounding. It's a breathtaking journey of the punchiest, darkest pop music you can imagine. Infused with S&Ds' characteristic Scottish folk influences and combined with some filthy guitar work, pounding drums and soaring choruses, it leaves you breathless and begging for more. If there is any justice in the world, Chains will be the song that makes Sons and Daughters the global superstars that they deserve to be.
Their gig last week at ULU was a real triumph. Usually London crowds are a little shy around Sons and Daughters. There's maybe something a little dark and confrontational about their performance that makes a crowd feel uneasy. It's especially noticable in the fluorescent light of an in-store that an audience can feel exposed and awkward in front of Sons and Daughters' collective menacing stare. For whatever reason, the gig at ULU melted that divide and had the whole front half of the (possible almost) sold out venue bopping along.
The S&Ds tore through a set of old, new and very old. Like their last two albums, which come at you like a speeding lorry of intensity and leave you battered and bruised, the gig was packed full of their meatiest, most powerful songs with hardly a moment's pause for a bit of Glaswegian banter.
It wouldn't be Sons and Daughters if it wasn't so, but it seemed that S&Ds have such a robust backcatalogue of established favourites that they might be slipping into playing a similar 'greatest hits' set night on night. It didn't quite feel like they were tearing through the set to get over with, but it's a real danger when you have a long tour ahead of you and you want to be winning people over every night to fall into a set routine. I have plenty of faith in S&D's artistic and performing integrity to quash any doubts that that might happen.
posted by Unknown at 2/16/2008 04:57:00 pm
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