Tuesday 11/03/08 Guillemots @ Shepherds Bush Empire, London

With less than two weeks until the release of Guillemots’ new album ‘Red’, the anticipation grows ever more intense with each passing day. Their new single ‘Get Over It’ seems set to storm up the charts faster than they’ve ever known before and is already winning them new fans across the board. And with good reason. This is the band, after all, that set souls alight in a glorious euphoria with the weird but utterly perfect pop songs of their debut album ‘Through the Windowpane’. It was an album I found to be like nothing else I’d heard and yet almost everything I could want from just twelve songs. They’ve got a lot to live up to.

Luckily, Guillemots are on form tonight and seem ecstatic about being back in the live arena. Despite all the hype about their upcoming second album, their set is a cautious one that leans slightly more towards their older material. Whether they are easing us in or whetting our appetites is unclear – it seems more likely they just still love playing those early songs. The crowd certainly love hearing them and throw themselves into celebration of Guillemots musical genius, from the magical pop mastery of ‘Trains to Brazil’ to the heart-wrenching epic madness of ‘Sao Paolo.’ At one point singer Fyfe Dangerfield mesmerises the entire audience into an awed silence for four glorious minutes as he performs a solo acoustic version of ‘We’re Here.’

However the crowd also eat up the new material with vigour and enthusiasm. The words of ‘Get Over It’ and free download ‘Kriss Kross’ already seem to be imprinted on the fans’ memories so to the point where they already feel like Guillemots’ classics. Launching straight into ‘Kriss Kross’ (which also opens the new album), the band seem more full of anger and passion than ever before: the song’s beautifully jarring opening is covered with thick distortion, sounding almost industrial before melting away into Fyfe’s trademark sweeping vocals and gorgeous melodies.

The band seem to bring a heavier sound to their new material, not least in the raucous rock and roll debauchery of ‘Big Dog,’ although it seems to sacrifice musicality and thoughtful lyrics a little in the process. But while Fyfe takes up the axe instead of the keyboards more than ever before, the weird experimentation and soulful singing hasn’t gone away. In fact Guillemots can now mix falsetto R n’ B vocals with noisy guitar rock better than anyone since Prince. Other highlights include the charming if initially unmemorable ‘Words’ – a duet with Ida Maria who comes fresh from a support slot with her band – and non-album track and live staple ‘21st of May', a which sounds like a frenetic Russian jig played with bucket loads of punk angst. Guillemots seem determined to push ideas and frontiers, in their own songs and in pop music in general. What’s more they do so without losing those things which made them special in the first place.