Elbow at First Avenue on 4/15/02
By: David de Young
It was hotter than Hell on the 15th of April in Minneapolis. Strange as it may seem, 91 is not normal for Minnesota this time of year. This fact was not lost on Guy Garvey, lead singer of the onetime Bury, England, now Manchester band Elbow, who wryly commented on the heat, suggesting it wasn’t mere coincidence. It’s possible he was right. Immediately upon launching into their set Elbow did much to help heat up an already packed First Avenue on Monday night.
This was Elbow’s first visit to Minnesota.
A few minutes into their first song, “Any Day Now,” the opening track on their debut album Asleep in the Back (V2 2001) it was apparent things were going to go very well that night. It’s hard to say the level of familiarity the crowd had with Elbow’s music coming into this show, but as with most acts supporting bigger name bands you can only assume that many people had not heard of them. A man near me commented, “They’ll win this crowd over yet,” and it was an understatement. The person I was with admitted that though she didn’t know what to make of their album on first hearing, she liked this. (Asleep in the Back is the kind of album that you must listen to several times before you really start to appreciate it.)
On this leg of their US tour with once New Jersey, now LA-based singer/songwriter Pete Yorn, Welsh drummer Owen Rossiter (a.k.a. Owen If) from the Stereo MCs was filling in for regular Elbow drummer Richard Jupp whose girlfriend was having a baby in Manchester. Rossiter and bassist Pete Turner provided a steady, somewhat industrial and chilling backbeat throughout the evening. A friend of the band, an accomplished filmmaker, provided additional dimension of multimedia to the show, showing a combination of pre-made films pertinent to each song and real-time live shots of the band that were hypnotically faded in and out. The video was tastefully applied, not as pretentious as I’d guess this affect must have been in the early days of the Velvet Underground when they did a similar thing. The multimedia being a nice augmentation by no means suggests this show didn’t stand by itself musically. Elbow is a already visually evocative band. Their music conjures up dark, rainy places I’ve never even been, ironically perhaps of the Manchester moors I used to envision when listening to the Smiths in 1983. (I’m not the first reviewer to make a Morrisey-Garvey comparison.) For the audio-visual setup to work properly (in other words, not to place the drummer at the back which would have been behind the screen), the band was set up a unconventionally with Rossiter sitting all the way on stage left. Next to him was guitarist Mark Potter (Pott), Guy Garvey sensibly placed in the middle looking much-like a scruffy Russell Crowe, Pete Turner on bass, and Craig Potter (Mark’s younger brother) on keyboards and organ at stage right.
After some cheerful banter, Garvey and company then launched into “Red”, written by Bassist Pete Turner. Red is one of the strongest songs on Asleep in the back, and a favorite of many. However, for me, and perhaps others “Newborn” was a highlight. “Newborn’s” opening lyrics strikes me as one of the most awesome first lines in a pop song I’ve ever heard. Who would think a song beginning “I’ll be the corpse in your bathtub / Useless” would turn out to be a powerful love song. But it most definitely is. I wondered if the rocking second half of this song would be as powerful live as it is on the album, and it was. In some ways it’s almost like two great songs spliced together, thematically related, but charged with different sorts of musical energy.
I didn’t take notes and can’t comment on the sequence of the set, but suffice it to say it ended too soon! I understand the remainder of the US tour is sold out, but if this review reaches you and you have a chance to see this show, you will not be disappointed! And I was excited to hear from Mark Potter that the band would not only be at Glastonbury (June 28th-30th), but also at V2002 (August 17th and 18th) in England this summer. And I definitely believe they will be one of the acts to see this year as word continues to spread.
Location Info:
First Avenue
Artist Info: Elbow
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