Delorentos at Vicar Street | Review

Delorentos at Vicar Street on November 1st 2013

Having spent the summer working on new material after winning the Choice Music award for best album, Delorentos return to the live circuit for a show at Dublin’s Vicar Street. Cove provide support with some energetic and impressive electro-pop. Their synths are rich and colourful, and the guitar crashes in with a vengeance when required. The band’s presence on stage is erratic and bizarre, with frantic vocals screamed whilst jumping manically around the stage, but that just makes their performance all the more intriguing. Tunes such as Silhouettes are fantastic, and Cove certainly set the bar high for the night’s main act.

Delorentos waste no time in proving why they are widely considered one of Ireland’s finest bands, with early highlight Pace Yourself showcasing the wonderful, wholesome indie sound that the band have honed to perfection. The band seem to improve with every song – always a sign of a significant live act – and the ‘Little Sparks’ tracks continue to delight the audience; the glorious Bullet In A Gun, and the tender Care For demonstrate just why their Choice award prize was thoroughly deserved. Aside from being top-drawer tunes, the band present the songs in a much more rugged way than on record, and the swapping of lead vocal duties contributes to a unique live experience. They slip one new song into their set, a delicate acoustic number that exhibits a gentler side to the band, but this is not the night to indulge in newer material, and they quickly return to their old classics.

The band inform the crowd that this is the busiest Vicar Street has ever been, and if the appreciative roar that greeted this statement is anything to go by, that certainly seems the case in that moment. The quality tunes keep on coming with the exceptional Petardu and the majestic Swimmer, a song where the band appear to tap into a deeper well of emotion and power than anything they’ve done before, and the massive crescendo is the peak of the night’s show. They trail off a little after this high, and don’t quite recapture that form until the encore. They do however take the time to interact with the crowd, and encourage them to record footage to appear in a new music video. The effortless way the group connect with the crowd is part of what makes Delorentos such a great act.

Encore tracks Stop, and especially the terrific indie anthem S.E.C.R.E.T prove however, that the band’s success doesn’t solely stem from ‘Little Sparks’, and that there are plenty of gems hidden within their back catalogue. The crowd goes bonkers for these closers, and encouraged by the band, commence to jump around and sing along. This is ultimately a stunning set from a band really beginning to fulfill their potential, playing music to put a smile on your face.