Snow Patrol at Koko (12/04/06)

Playing second after Desert Hearts' blandly noisy rock, The Spinto Band have an amazing jerky energy both musically and physically (almost all six of them dance or hop around constantly) which makes their entire set of bouncy, lunatic guitar pop (a bit like the madder
bits of The Coral's debut album with darkness and blues replaced by sunny harmonies) a total joy to watch. The only slight worry is that at first this energy seems to be all that's carrying them through a lack of much in the way of good songs, but later Direct To Helmet and Oh Mandy, among others, suggest that there is at least a little substance there to back it up. They even get away with all bringing out kazoos for the final song.



Snow Patrol are here to preview new album 'Eyes Open' and do an impressively good job of it - rock theatrics are not exactly whats expected but the likes of a thudding, thrilling Hands Open are well suited to jumping on and off drumkits and acting like this is an arena already. Even new single You're All That I Have is somehow transformed from a damp squib on record into a fantastic highlight. With these and others (Open Your Eyes, Shut Your Eyes, etc.) more universal than ever, they could probably just as easily have played a lot more new songs without throwing Chocolate and Spitting Games in almost immediately and still have kept the audience as rapt.
In fact somewhat surprisingly, considering that Gary Lightbody's speciality in both Snow Patrol and The Reindeer Section has long been naked confessionals, its the slower new ones which fall flat, Chasing Cars in particular the one new song which goes from sounding like a scaled up version of the better bits of 'Final Straw' to actually sounding like a calculated attempt at replicating Run's success. One particularly lovely (and naggingly familiar) new acoustic song also turns out to actually be a stripped down version of Grazed Knees from 'Final Straw'. Oops. There is still aching beauty here though with possibly the best song of the set An Olive Grove Facing The Sea. This is one of only two songs played from their first two albums (the other is debut single Starfighter Pilot) which is a shame but very understandable - they're dedicated to 'the seven people who bought this at the time', although it's perhaps worth remembering that barely any more bought 'Final Straw' on its first release in 2003.
Even fantastic old songs don't exactly offer the same kind of pleasure as over a thousand people belting out the final lines of Run in unison anyway, with Gary looking at this point like he can't believe his luck. On tonight's evidence they don't have any more songs to quite match it since but with another impressive album it could be a look he'll repeat more in the year to come.

(thanks to Kate for the picture. And for saving a space and everything)