Sep 03 2008 2:58 pm,
Conor Oberst & The
Electric Ballroom,
27/08/2008
Not many acts kick off a gig by sticky-taping down sonically jarring synth keys while tooting on a harmonica - so you’ve got to give it to Euros Childs for attempting to show the Electric Ballroom crowd something a little different. The crowd respond favourably, and well they might, as the ex-Gorky’s frontman - who cuts a comical figure, jerking and jiggling around in an oversized t-shirt - doles out everything from country ditties to wonky yelp pop and ELO-esque atmospherics in both Welsh and English. Talented chap.
Conor Oberst’s headline slot is an altogether more raucous affair, despite the singer suffering from a hacking cough, as he ploughs into tracks from his recently released eponymous LP. ‘Sausalito’, ‘Get-Well-Cards’, ‘Moab’ and ‘Eagle On A Pole’ sound huge and, for the first time, truly anthemic in this live setting, and when he’s not bawling and stuttering into the microphone, Oberst allows members of The Mystic Valley Band to lead various tracks, such as guitarist Taylor Hollingsworth’s stomper ‘Central City’, Rilo Kiley sticksman Jason Boesel’s ‘ I Gotta Reason #1’ and the Bob Dylan-esque ‘Sundown’ courtesy of Nik Freitas. It’s the Oberst-fronted numbers, however, which really send the crowd into a frenzy; ‘Danny Callahan’ provokes one man to scream “Conor you’re a fucking legend” and a ferocious version of ‘Souled Out!!!’ even sees people head-banging and punching the air – rare responses indeed to what is essentially a country show.
As he waltzes back onstage, two drinks in hand, to join his five-piece band for a jazz trumpet-tinged version of Harry Nilsson’s ‘Everybody’s Talkin’, bluesy traditional folk standard ‘Corrina Corrina’, ‘I Don’t Want To Die (In The Hospital)’’s helter-skelter attack and spine-tingling newbie ‘Breezy’, Oberst seems pretty un-topple-able from his place as emotionally charged indie’s premier poster boy. Even sickness doesn’t stop him from bringing the house down.
Camilla Pia
