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Cathartic and erratic

January 27, 2012
By Travis Welowszky

 

Performance: 4.5/

Setlist: 3.5/5

Crowd: 4/5

Worth the Cash: 4.5/5

Overall: 4.5/5

As you grow older, the death of a relationship weighs a little heavier. The pressure of settling down conflicts with the youthful freedom that slips away towards the back end of your teenage years. These themes are at the heart of Los Campesinos’ fourth LP, Hello Sadness, which brought the seven piece rock outfit to the London Music Hall this past Monday night.

Hailing from Cardiff, on the southern coast of Wales, Los Campesinos feature a distinctive brand of high-energy indie-pop with a crowded setup employing three guitars, two keyboards, ukulele, glockenspiel and tambourines. Raucous drums and blood-gush guitars provide foundation for Gareth Campesinos’ tongue and cheek lyrical dexterity. Songs centred on unfulfilling sex, binge drinking, and doomed romances are held together with carefully crafted pop hooks and melodies shining light onto the darkness. The band captures everything it means to be twenty—it’s irrational, it’s blunt, but most importantly it’s entirely from the heart.

Portland’s Parenthetical Girls had the opening slot and delivered on a performance heightened by the on-stage antics of singer Zac Pennington. The group played a gorgeously hazy set of baroque pop tied around impulsive vocal deliveries ranging from hushed conversations with an ex-lover to full on-stage theatrics. Pennington pranced across the floors, wrapping wires around tables and audience members alike with boldness that would have made a young Freddie Mercury blush.

Emerging to an eager crowd, Los Campesinos launched into a catalogue of modern breakup anthems. Cathartic and erratic, the septet performed with a youthful abandon that was empowering and destructive at the same time. Leading with single “By Your Hand,” the band executed a healthy set list of new material and fan favourite mainstays.

The unpredictable performance translated seamlessly to an audience who provided solid supporting vocals all night, helping burn through the jealous fires on “We Are Beautiful, We Are Doomed” and building to the climactic dance floor jam “You! Me! Dancing!” Capping the evening with Hello Sadness standout “Baby I Got The Death Rattle,” Gareth Campesinos and band lead the audience through an impassioned closing coda of “Not headstone, but headboard is where I want to be mourned.”

Through spilled beer and boisterous rock, the evening was characterized with a heartfelt motif delivered by a band with a genuine fervor for performance. Los Campesinos proved unafraid to balance on the edge of emotional collapse and never hesitated to bring the audience right to the brink with them.

 

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