Soldout show with The Walkmen as headliner / Inrocks Indie Club.
Opening bands:
- Franz Is Dead
- Frankie & The Heartstrings
N.B.: I know better the two opening bands than the headliner. You probably won't believe me, but it's true... ahem...
Franz Is Dead(FR)
8:00pm (?) - 8:45pm
Franz Is Dead is actually the solo project of the French musician Laurent Blot who also plays in the bands Eldia and Please Don’t Blame Mexico. I saw him perform for this project in June 2009 in a small venue where he was joined by the drummer Olivier Marguerit (who played/plays for Fugu, The Chiltons, Syd Matters, Toy Fight, My Girlfriend Is Better Than Yours, Wilfried, Bless), and also the bassist Julien Gaulier (who plays for Hey Hey My My). This time, I didn't know the two other musicians on stage. I missed half of the performance, but quite enjoyed the songs they performed. They were joined for a song by the female singer of the band The Rodeo. If I don't make any mistake, they played the songs 'Ladybug', 'Let It Go' and 'I Don't Know You' to close the set. Did they play 'You Can Try It', 'Obscene', 'Overdrive It' and songs from the last album 'Ah-Leu-Cha' released on Emergence? Probably...
Franz Is Dead - Ladybug
Franz Is Dead - Let It Go
Frankie & The Heartstrings(UK)
The 1st time I heard of this band was when I found the band name on the 2010 Glastonbury lineup for the little game about the bands names I launched on Twitter months ago.
9:00pm - 9:40pm (?)
It began to be very warm in the crowded venue. 1st Paris gig for this five-piece band from Sunderland, North-East of the UK, just after touring New York and Tokyo and playing at London Calling Festival in the Netherlands. They opened in previous gigs for artists like Florence & The Machine, Girls, Edwyn Collins, The Futureheads, Summer Camp.
Frankie Francis, the lead singer of the band, entertained the audience with only the microphone on his right hand and without playing any instrument. He danced, jumped everywhere and also hopped on stage in a perky, excited and theatrical way, invited the audience to sing along and to clap their hands. I remember that they played their last single 'Ungrateful' from their debut LP called 'Ungrateful' released on their own label Pop Sex LTD, the songs 'Want You Back', 'Tender', 'Hunger', 'What Goes Around' and 'Fragile' (favorite song). Very catchy, enthousiastic and entertaining show. Unforgettable chorus. They are considered as a retro pop band. 1950s British look and 1980s pop music like Orange Juice, Pulp, The Smiths. I had the impression that most of the French crowd never heard of them before, but there were some fans, and that's great! By the way, they interact a lot with people on Twitter, so follow them!
To know more about the band, read their interview in May with Jen Long for The Line Of Best Fit and also the interesting one by 4or The Record.
Frankie & The Heartstrings - Fragile (official music video)
Frankie & The Heartstrings - Ungrateful (Live at 2010 BBC Introducing stage)
Frankie & The Heartstrings - Tender (Live at 2010 BBC Introducing stage)
I had a short talk with Michael (the first one on the left). Very nice guys! ;)
The Walkmen(US)
10:15pm - 11:30pm
To be honest, I don't know well this "famous" band, even it's the headliner of the show. I didn't really manage to listen to their last album in its entirety and in one go. I don't really like the singer's voice. Their songs seem to be all similar. I should try later again, need maybe more time to appreciate the songs. As everybody seems to "adore" their last album 'Lisbon' (released on Fat Possum Records and Bella Union) and as I was able to afford the ticket (€11,80), why not to see these men on stage? We waited about 30 minutes after Frankie & The Heartstrings' performance, people got angry and excited at the same time. The venue was so hot, no air conditioning so you have to buy more drinks (?), difficult to be concentrated. You could be easily in a sweat without moving. It always happens in this venue when the show is soldout. It means about 250 persons there. So... how was the show? Good performance, great electric guitar players, smart men, Paris audience who knew every song and lyrics. But I didn't feel excited about it... I only recognized the song 'Woe Is Me' with the catchy electric guitar notes. It's obvious that their fans felt all lucky and delighted to see them live. Some people made weird noises in the audience while others pushed others, not very nice of them...
Uncertain setlist. The one that one of my friends got seems to be not the right one because there were songs missing on it. The Paris setlist looks more like the one of their last show in... Lisbon (below). We also got 3 encore.
Setlist of Lisbon's gig (source):
While I Shovel The Snow
Very nice pictures of The Walkmen by Spirit of Ectasy, and of all the bands ( 1 | 2 | 3 ) by Isatagada, and ( 1 | 2 | 3 ) by Robert Gil.
2 comments:
Pas mécontent de mon voyage, The Walkmen valait largement le coup. Je vais essayer de faire un petit compte-rendu, mais je renverrais vers chez toi pour les deux premières parties histoire d'éviter de dire du mal ;-)
Link: http://tumblr.com/xnrra12eu
Merci! ;)
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