The Beat Surrender

Anybody who has read this site for a while will know that Blur are my favourite band and that I’ve also been a keen follower of any of Damons side projects. So when I heard he’d teamed up with The Clash basis Paul Simonen, The Verve guitarist Simon Tong (who has toured with Blur in the absence of Graham Coxon) and legendary drummer Tony Allen…then obviously my ears pricked up.

Wind on a few months and the fruits of their labour are now out in the public domain in the guise of their self titled album. It’s a melodic, traditionally very British sounding album which shows the maturity of all concerned with it. The playing and the vocals are as you would expect exceptional.

When tickets went on sale for this gig I missed out originally, luckily it tied in around the same time as my birthday (a couple of weeks prior) so my girlfriend managed to put our morals aside (I usually wouldn’t condone it) and used Ebay to snaffle up a couple of tickets for slightly over the odds.

I’ve been to the Irish Centre before to see bands (Oasis and Hard-Fi) so it’s not a big culture shock for me. It is though a real pleasure to see a band and performers of this stature playing there, chosen probably as it’s Working Mens Club style layout fits with the concept of the album.

The night gets off to a slightly odd start with the fairground style organ music that is piped out on constant rotation. Heading towards about half past eight though the expectant crowd are woken from their pre-gig slumber by a large booming voice that comes in the shape of the slightly larger than life Master of Ceremonies, who also doubles as a stand up comedian.

He introduces the first act, a sword swallowing, juggling double act in Victorian dress. Once they have departed to a mixed reception we actually get some music in the form of Indigo Moss. While it’s not really my sort of thing (bluegrass) they are professional and good at what they do.

A bit more comedy from the entertaining Master of Ceremonies and a burst of reggae songs (probably Simonen’s choice I’d guess) and finally the main act arrive. The album is played in full, the crowd are entertained and enthralled by their performance, Albarn takes centre stage in the main, but at times when seated at the piano, Simonen then struts into the middle of the stage and fills the void.

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