Miles Kane @ Electric Ballroom

Camden Electric Ballroom
Tuesday 25th October

I’ve always wondered what it would be like to go on tour, every night a different town, the hotels, the travelling, the after show parties, I’m sure it’s an amazing way to live. But with the inevitable highs I’m sure you would get the downside also and as soon as the novelty wears off the ‘5 minutes before show-time’ nerves disappear completely by the 5th or 6th shows and then the simple reality of routine slips in and it all becomes the daily grind and part of your ‘working week’.

This would have been my viewpoint until I saw Miles Kane at the Electric Ballroom. I’ve seen him and his band 5 or 6 times this year alone, from Camden Barfly to Reading Festival. Amazingly, I think he’s getting stronger in his performance, his enjoyment and the overall feel of each gig. If this is the kind of stride he’s hitting after a single debut album then by the time he releases a 3rd or 4th album I would think stadiums will be the only way you’re going to see him this side of a main stage festival performance.

I have been to many, many gigs and although most of them are enjoyable enough to watch and experience, generally with the best will in the world a few songs into the set you’ll start to see the blue glow of phones clicking on throughout the crowd and twitter and Facebook status’ being updated, missing the musical wood for the trees. Again, this wasn’t happening tonight! From the opening ‘Better Left Invisible’ to the encore ‘Inhaler’, Kane had the audience staring into his eyes and caught between his guitar strings throughout. Personal highlights tonight for me included the now classic ‘Come Closer’, ‘King Crawler’ and his excellent covers of The Beatles ‘Hey Bulldog’ and Jacques Dutronc’s ‘The Responsible’ which shows his musical depth and appreciation.

As a long time fan of Miles Kane and his work before his official solo outing I’ve always had the pining for more collaboration with Alex Turner and more Last Shadow Puppets material although with a wave of good will he’s currently on I think album number 2 is and should be the priority at this time as wasting this individual power surge of attitude and rock and roll would be a shame.

Kaka boom!

Set list

1. Better Left Invisible
2. Counting Down The Days
3. Rearrange
4. Before It’s Midnight
5. Kingcrawler
6. Happenstance
7. Take The Night From Me
8. Quicksand
9. The Responsible (Jacques Dutronc Cover)
10. My Fantasy
11. Colour Of The Trap
12. Telepathy
13. Woman’s Touch
14. Hey Bulldog (The Beatles Cover)
15. Come Closer

Encore
16. Inhaler


many thanks to Alex Fordham at Authority Communications
photo by Sarah Doone