“How’s he going to go out and sign stuff, after that?”
“Maybe he’ll get the roadies or someone to pass the CDs back into the dressing room.”
This overheard exchange seemed to be largely representative of the discussions taking place in the gents’ toilets after Mark Lanegan had turned in a colossal 21-song set to a rapt and near sell-out crowd. It was fair comment. At the end of the set, Langean’s guitarist had hung back on stage to announce the man himself would be at the merchandise stall shortly. The idea of Mark Lanegan signing CDs, shooting the breeze and nodding and smiling in response to several dozen fans gushing “Great set, loving your work” seemed, ell, a little improbable.
No-one was doubting the quality of the performance: despite their bassist being absent due to appendicitis, they stoically went ahead with the show and produced a sound that was full and balanced.
The set had been meticulously ordered to ensure the changes of mood, tempo and volume kept things moving. That the set drew heavily on his most recent album, ‘Phantom Radio’ and its attendant EP ‘No Bells on Sunday’ was, of course, no surprise, and the electro-centric songs contrasted with the blues and country orientated material from his previous albums. Unusually for an artist with such a substantial oeuvre, some of his more commercially successful work was left aside in favour of selected highlights from his solo career (for example, ‘When You’re Number Isn’t Up’ and ‘Hit the City’ were the only songs taken from ‘Bubblegum’). Even a man down, they still rocked it with ‘The Gravedigger’s Song’ and while no Queens of the Stone Age material featured, the Twilight Singers song ‘Deepest Shade’ and Soulsavers track ‘Revival’ (which opened the encore) touched on Lanegan’s extensive catalogue of collaborations.
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The musicianship was faultless, the nuances carrying into the large auditorium. Lanegan was in fine voice and sang with soul.
“Please, say something,” a girl behind me pleaded five songs into the set, following a magnificently delicate ‘Low’.
“Thanks” was as much as we were going to get during the night.
But really, “How’s it going Leeeeds?” was never going to cut it.
The lively support duo, Sean Wheeler and Zander Schloss had sated our need for banter, while also delivering a powerful set of gospel-fuelled country.
Banter just isn’t Lanegan’s thing. Lanegan’s reputation precedes him, and his cultivated aloofnes is integral to the atmosphere. This isn’t the kind of show you attend to jump around and yearn to feel a surging rapport with the artist: Lanegan is on stage to give his all to the songs, and the less distraction the better. Hence, the low-level lighting on stage. He stands, bespectacled and dishevelled, welded to the mic stand. He stands, and he broods, and he sings, in that rich, gravelly voice that conveys a life lived. He channels it all so perfectly. And then, following masterful renditions of ‘I Am the Wolf’ and ‘The Killing Season’ he retreats once more into the darkness.
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