The Departure Lounge

The Roundhouse, London

In the suitcases that rested by the artists’ exit somewhere amongst the plaid shirts, frayed plectrums and beard trimmers sat the one-way plane tickets and airport hotel reservations for foreign lands. There was something of the new beginnings that entertained the Roundhouse on November 2nd. Nine months after the release of The Courage of Others, Midlake, supported by John Grant and Jason Lytle, returned to London in support of the album.

Jason Lytle (Grandaddy) and John Grant (the Czars) enjoyed over two decades of relative success between them in their respective outfits before financial issues and disagreements assented the bands to perish. With cautious gaits, Grant and Lytle each took to the stage to play in front of a politely compressed, mostly middle-aged audience. They performed to promote their first solo efforts since the breakups, but the older audience, versed with Grant and Lytle’s discographies, only served to achieve the impression of a man being met with vigilant eyes as he moved to another community in the hope that he may begin again.

No such history has dogged Midlake. In the decade since their genesis they’ve released three full albums and as many EPs with escalating success.  Bamnan and Silvercork [2004] and The Trials of Van Occupanther [2006] enjoyed strong critical acclaim; the latter in particular offered a number of handsomely-crafted, haunting harmony-driven tracks. After the album’s success we might have expected it to have been a prototype for future offerings but if this is the case The Courage of Others is a departure. Lacking the rousing foot-tappers of ‘Roscoe’ or ‘Young Bride’, the album is a collection of tenebrous averments that alert us to the burdens of humankind. Delicately-plucked guitars sear into your consciousness, heated by prog-rock junctures and pronounced with a chilling flute – each song a scythe to the contented mind. Despite this, perhaps because of this, the album has been a commercial success, reaching top 100 chart entries across the globe and a top 20 in the UK.

However, between songs on that Tuesday night in Camden when silence filled the arena, the audience members did not yell for the subtle agony of ‘Acts of Man’ or the impelling cadence of ‘In the Ground’, they begged for ‘Roscoe’ and ‘Head Home’. It’s not that the album doesn’t deliver; its sales record disconfirms that notion. But the mid-week professional crowd of London do not want to be reminded of the sins of their corporate employers or the various abuses and ruin being inflicted upon London’s occupants as they enjoy a cold one by the bar; courage here is a misgiving.

New beginnings and musical formula abandonment might summate the evening but the encore revisited the canonical; it included a sublime rendition of Grandaddy’s ‘A.M. 180’ as Grant and Lytle relived their days as frontmen of a band in total concord.

Artwork by: Sam Derbyshire

Christo Hall
The New Wolf 

last time modified: July 15, 2011, 8:10 a.m.