Jonathan Geddes verdict: three stars
Earlier this year Kasabian gave an interview where they railed against the conservative, laddish reputation their music has been tagged as over the past decade. This gig at one stage featured a flashing screen with buckie written on it, indicating they perhaps protest too much. There are very much two sides to the Leicester group, and in a live setting there was only ever going to be one winner.
Still, they can serve up surprises, like the acoustic opening here, where the band's joint commanders, Tom Meighan and Serge Pizzorno, appeared and slipped into Bumblebee. It was a false dawn, though the ensuing raucous bombardment had its moments, with Shoot The Runner resembling a steroid-pumped Spirit In The Sky, and Fast Fuse a lost 1960s TV theme only missing a pop art POW! behind it. The continual noise suffered, however, from a variable mix that sometimes suggested the band were performing from a building site.
What frustrates about Kasabian is that they do pursue interesting sonic directions, yet often then leather on a big chant over the top and drown those styles out. So the groove underpinning Clouds gave way to an anthem by numbers, while the strum-along of Thick As Thieves became a Kinks pastiche, and Club Foot was surprisingly lumbering, with the charismatic Meighan appearing less propulsive than usual.
The consistent rowdiness certainly appeased any pint throwing instincts, but the night's most satisfying moments occurred near the end of the main set, when the teeth-rattling bass of the club friendly Treat paved the way for the cocksure swagger of Empire. The brute force remained, but in a more creative manner than in much of this excitable, yet familiar set.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article