Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Ikara Colt and The Loves
the venue: Sheffield Leadmill
the date: Mon 24th Feb 2003
Twenty past eight. Claire Ingram and Paul Resende – guitarist and vocalist respectively with Ikara Colt – are ready to begin the last song of a frantic half-hour set. But there’s a problem. Dominic Young, the band’s drummer, is slumped over his snare, dripping with an absolutely breathtaking amount of sweat. “Are you trying to kill me?” he manages to gasp, noticeably short of air. By way of an answer, his bandmates begin the final song regardless. And yet he still pounds the drums as if he were one-on-one in the ring with Naseem Hamed. Top work. Curiously enough, Resende dedicates the song to the hobby of ornithology.
It’s one of two unnamed new songs Ikara Colt unveil tonight. They’re the highlights of the band’s set, more assured than any of the other, more familiar, songs they play this evening. Where, say, 'Sink Venice' falters either side of its first rate chorus, the new songs strut from beginning to end. Disappointingly, however, 'Rudd' – still their finest moment – goes unplayed.
An hour earlier. The Loves have the stage. There’s the distinctive flavour of the Velvet Underground to much of the six-piece’s work, especially the likes of 'Chelsea Girl'. But it’s on such songs that the band are at their most flimsy – Catrin Love is really no Nico and there’s nothing alluring or aspirational about her vocal stint. Nevermind. It’s not the whole story. The larger part of the set sees The Loves become a far more appetising proposition. Enter songs such as 'Little Girl Blues' – when Simon Love takes over vocals – and the band come over like the MC5 rehashing the Grease soundtrack – the sound of rock ‘n’ roll sleaze deflowering the purest of summer night Junior High School parties.
And so to the end of the night. Karen O is dribbling Stella Artois over herself, thrusting her arms in the air to the opening chords of 'Bang'. Every so often – on catching a thousand pairs of eyes staring straight at her – she grins meekly, and for a second or so is beguilingly coy. But her guard is quickly resumed. Karen O’s confidence, her assertive presence, is truly phenomenal. For a new song, which she describes as the band’s love song, she wraps her blue net scarf across her face – her hair caught beneath, half-covering her eyes – and sings alternately through two different microphones, then both at once. The playfulness of her performance is infectious and easily carries over to crowd. Her humour may be cock-eyed, but it's also warm and charismatic. And not nearly so juvenile as that of punk rock performers in so, so many lesser bands. Karen O has star power. And a great rock ‘n’ roll voice besides.
Her energy is especially vital tonight. Touring prior to their debut album’s release, the majority of the band’s set is made up of material that is new to most of the audience. However, the quality of the new songs is consistently high, and the pace suitably unrelenting. 'Y-Control' shines especially brightly, a blast of tightly wound, edgy, helter-skelter scratch rock. You’d never notice that most of the instrumental work was being done by a solitary guitar. And there’s also an unexpected amount of variety drawn from the band’s sparse arrangement. Every one of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ songs snarls and seduces, but undercuts are mixed with right-hooks and no-messing knees in the groin, as chopped guitar stanzas alternate with measured interludes of pure discordant release. And so it's no surprise when the YYY’s rapidly pummel their audience into sustained - and entirely willing - submission. Superb.