Live Review: The Reflektors @ The Roundhouse, 11/11/13
Within a week of Arcade Fire’s fourth album ‘Reflektor’ topping the UK and US album chart we caught them live for a rather special performance at The Roundhouse in London. Using the fake band name The Reflektors they invited attendees to don their finest garb for a masked ball that would be a defining show in their career.
Think about Arcade Fire’s records for a second and it’s hard to image them as one of the biggest bands on the planet, but as front man Win Butler said during the show, he’s glad “there are enough weirdos to make it number one.” Katy Perry, Metallica or Mumford & Sons they most certainly are not – however smash them together and it’s not actually far off. They play interesting, sporadically beautiful songs with heated aggression and ever increasing groove as their catalogue grows, helped most recently by James (LCD Soundystem) Murphy. It’s brilliant of course, but explain them to a stranger and you sound like a religious nutter. Throughout the years since debut album Funeral they have persistently redefined what live rock music is, while neither playing up to indie clichà nor art-school vibes, without any compromise in fact, and it’s that which has allowed them to punch above their weight, collecting more weirdos with each record and tour, making them possibly the biggest small band in the world.
People are happy to get involved with Arcade Fire’s dress code for the night; displaying a simple old school fandom, something which is ever on the decrease these days. They’re just excited to be part of the band. That respect from fans has been earned over four incredible albums and consistently faultless live performances which can grant such an odd band the success they’ve had, and adoration of the audience.
Calling themselves The Reflektors for the Roundhouse show certainly hinted at a new album heavy set, which was the order of the night as most of the new tracks got an airing. Opening on title song ‘Reflektor’ and smashing into the classic ‘Power Out’ is how you get noticed, and though almost nothing else form Funeral, Neon Bible or The Suburbs comprised the setlist, there was no feelings of disappointment. This did feel like a different band from what we’d seen before, with Win’s less sweaty, more charismatic stage presence, giant fiberglass heads, disco balls, and oh yeah, that groove we mentioned before.
They created an environment and filled it with an entirely new persona, a remarkable feat and an experience to witness. By not catering too much to older material you could appreciate a song like ‘It’s Never Over’ within the context of Reflektor, helping it settle a bit in your mind. As is the case with any Arcade Fire release there’s some getting your head around it to figure out where they’ve hidden all those stunning, juicy moments. This show went a long way to helping with that, communicating the atmosphere of the album, and the carnival-like attitude of it. In that respect it was a very important performance as it showed the band as one that could shift gears into almost any direction and have the capacity to see it though, and more importantly have it feel right for you, the listener.
What they have done, is the same as they always do, and that’s offer a respectable claim to the title of “best live in the world right now”, and for infinitely different reasons they could have done ten years ago.
– Alex Lee Thomson
