Fratellis at the Forum

What a fine gig this was, made all the better by the fact that I hadn't even planned to go. I was merely offered a spare ticket and being me, took it up. I rarely turn down an invitation! 

So obviously I turned up early, well in time to see the first of the support bands. This turned out to be group of young Brummies called Overpass. And it was a good start to the evening. While I wouldn't describe them as stars in the making, they were a very decent indie band and if they ever popped up again in a small venue in London I would happily go to see them. So hope they do.

The second support was a band called Johnny Mac and the Faithful. Clearly not exactly spring chickens, but they were just enormous fun on stage. Actually they looked all ages - as if they were a family who just turned up to play on the night. The chap on accordion looked barely old enough to shave, while the lead singer looked like he had been touring for decades. But they were just superbly energetic fun, playing what I might best describe as celtic rock. As I said to my friend, they would be just the most amazing band to play at a wedding. And normally one would sneer at a "wedding band" but I meant that in a flattering way. They had just such a joyous enthusiastic sound. They would also be brilliant to start up a music festival. Get everyone in the mood. My only fear was that rather than warming us up for the Fratellis, they might have overheated us!

But I need not have feared - the Fratellis were terrific too. Despite both the Fratellis and the preceding act being from Glasgow, they could not have been more contrasting, in that Johnny Mac and the Faithful were so very Glasgow, while the Fratellis betrayed no hint of Glasgow - if you had asked me I might have assumed an American heritage. Jon Fratelli  (actually John Lawler - all three band members use Fratelli as stage surname, but they aren't related) doesn't go in for much banter with the audience and isn't really a magnetic, charismatic frontman. But he does have a very decent voice. And the band benefitted enormously as a spectacle, and as a sound, from three young ladies on backing vocals (who unfortunately were at the very edge of the stage where I was standing so couldn't get proper photos except in profile, but largely obscured by the speakers) and a brass section of trumpeter and saxophonist, who were both very good and amusingly got very much into the groove.

 In addition to their repertoire of fine anthems, especially songs off their storming first album Costello Music, they performed two exceptional and unlikely cover versions - finishing the encore with the old rock n roll standard, Runaround Sue, but much earlier on in the set playing a wonderful adaptation of the seventies europop hit "Yes Sir, I Can Boogie". 

As I say, overall an evening of great joy, at a delightful venue - the Forum in Kentish Town.