Little Green Cars at Vicar Street | Review

Little Green Cars at Vicar Street, 7th of December 2013

Having strapped a leash on their début album ‘Absolute Zero’ and taken it for a stroll around the world, Little Green Cars return to their hometown for two nights in Vicar Street. The clean dry sound of their pop-rock has drawn music-lovers both casual and obsessed to the venue tonight, an indication of both the group’s stylishness and their incredible musical and songwriting talent.

Before the headliners arrive it is Bleeding Heart Pigeons who are tasked with plugging the room into the wall and charging it up. They’ve been touring with Little Green Cars for a while now and their “out there” electronic sounds manage to both serve and contrast that band’s sound beautifully. Some in the crowd seem slightly frightened at the group’s brief sojourns into screamy singing, but their song Catharsis contains a brilliantly endearing riff that lands somewhere between a video game theme and an old school Arctic Monkeys number to calm the nerves of even the jumpiest attendees.

In darkness the five members of Little Green Cars stand behind their microphones, while Stevie Appleby approaches his, singing the opening lines to the acappella Red. On the chorus the four other members of the band blend their voices into a single harmonised hum while Stevie’s characteristic whine hangs over it. The performance contains all the flawlessness of a studio recording, and the kind of perfect timing that would make you think they’ve all been hooked up to a metronome. It’s a standard of the gig that they act more like the ten limbs and five voices of a single entity than five individuals playing together.

This may be both a blessing and a curse. While they do perform with an enviable tightness the songs almost sound like carbon copies of the album recordings. It’s not a big deal for first-timers to a Little Green Cars gig, but the talent of these five musicians is obvious and they’re almost reaching breaking point with these songs. You want to see them break loose because the gig they play tonight is the same gig they played nine months ago and the band has changed and improved, but the songs haven’t.

It’s a minor criticism of a band that are clearly in the early stages of what will undoubtedly be a lengthy musical career, but the desire to hear Faye – who is on top form tonight – sing something slower, more soulful and funky, is almost overpowering. You want Dylan – who misses nary a beat the whole night – to really let loose on the drums, or for the whole band to feel rather than remember their way through the songs, to go somewhere unexpected. You want to not know what’s going to happen next.

But they’re still in showcasing mode and they do what they do with the kind of professionalism that would put most other bands to shame. Renditions of Them, Harper Lee, My Love Took Me Down To The River To Silence Me and Please are played with the kind of matter-of-factness reminiscent of early Beatles performances, and like that band’s early material you see glimpses of potential lurking beneath the sleek surface here, of the soul that is confined by the form.

Two things support the idea that the band is coming to a turning point. The first is the performance of the final song of the main set, The John Wayne. When the song breaks from the slow intro to the upbeat rhythm it doesn’t crash the way it should, like it did back in March. Perhaps this is a levels issue but the energy is missing from the song. The second thing is the new song The Factory, performed at the back of the venue. It’s slightly more soulful with an almost gospel-like call-response vocal harmony, yet another indication of their move away from the loud rock-based numbers that currently fill their set. Either way, at this point in time, the only thing more exciting than Little Green Cars’ musical achievements is their potential.