The Academy was slow to fill up on Friday night, which might explain the slight delay on the bands arrival, although I did notice The Coronas asserting their position up on the balcony. By the time the band were belting out their opening track 23 Things I Don’t Like it seemed to be a pretty full house. When the song finished the crowd were chanting for Mick Pyro, which encouraged a bit of banter between the front man and an audience member: “You’re a ride Mick!” “What? You’re a ride too.” This led Mick to introduce some new stuff which he described as “a bit dancey, so you can enjoy the stuff you don’t know.” Sorry and Please Stop Fucking With Me (not completely sure on the song titles) delivered Micks word and got the crowd bopping along. It wasn’t until Shame that I felt the crowd were really in to it.
I have to say that Mick seemed to be in great form, he was looking well, nice and trim and in a rather fetching silk Chinese style pull over. Things mellowed out slightly for Girl I’m Gonna Fuck You Up, with the crowd particularly enjoying the lalalala chorus. The song wrapped up with Mick instigating a sort of guitar duel.
After a superb performance of You Know It, Mick thanked everybody for coming to the show, and that people like the audience are whats going to pull us out of this recession. (Well that was what I took from it.) This sparked him on to have a type of sing off with the crowd, ranging from different octaves to lalalas and ooohs. He then went on to see which member of the band could reach the highest pitch cleverly leading us in to I Like Music. One of their new songs The Man got a great reaction from the crowd, as did Awful Cold.
Mick introduced their “best song yet”, their breakout track Comeback Girl, which included what seemed to be a spontaneous rap towards the end of the song. Steady Song began with Mick getting the males and females to sing separately as they began the song. Finishing up telling the crowd that the next time they play, which is in a month as part of their residency, they will play for three hours, a point which he had hit on a few times during the night. The band bid their farewells to the crowd.
The mandatory One More Tune rang through the Academy, the crowd were in luck as the band reemerged on stage beginning with a jam of solos from each member of the band. Busting Loose and Oh No were the final tracks of the night. All in all it was a really entertaining performance. If this gig is anything to go by the next three in the residency are going to a lot of fun.
