Bat For Lashes show was at the AB yesterday.
I'm not among the biggest fans of the Ancienne Belgique. As a music fan, once your favourite artist reaches an AB-sized fanbase, you're basically screwed. Ticket prices are really expensive, potato chips get fished out of your backpack (you can buy a mini-bag of chips for 'only' 2 euros in the vending machine inside), plus the club is a little too big for intimate concerts.
Luckily, however, the AB sound quality lives up to the expensive prices. To my own surprise, the Bat For Lashes show ended up selling out in the final week before the show. Bearing in mind the totally undercrowded New Found Glory in the same venue at the end of May, I guess primetime radio airplay is still invaluable to artists seeking an audience.
The opening act (Heceba or something) sounded pretty electronic, nothing too memorable.
The set had a skeleton and some spiderwebs on the microphone, but with Natascha Khan, it was hard to tell whether that was a special Halloween setup or just the standard setup. If I saw correctly, she still has the same supporting band as with the earlier tours for the latest record, with the drummer from New Young Pony Club, en Charlotte Hatherley, guitar player for Ash and solo artist. I was wondering throughout the show whether supporting Bat For Lashes is really that fun, songs center around her voice and piano playing, and some beats are programmed, so the drummer is actually sitting idle a lot, singing background vocals. Some goes for the sparse bass and regular guitar play support. I guess both either like the song material a lot, or like the economic support for their other musical endeavours.
Onto the show, Natascha came dressed in some kind of black dress with a belt, and a wolf mask on her back. Crowd was asked to howl before 'The Wizard' kicked in, no other Halloween references were made. Sonically and vocally, this was an impeccable gig. Khan in her own way is a dedicated, focused performer and even though it probably was a show on routine, I didn't really came across that way. "Glass" is always a strong opener, biggest hits "What's a girl to do" and "Daniel" were played in succession around the middle part of the set, "Trophy" and "Sleep alone" being the interchangeable songs that aid the set buildup but were the weakest moments in my book, with "Siren Song" the heartbreaking highpoint of the set, definitely one of the songs of the year in my book. The crowd was appreciative, and succeeded in shutting up most of the time. A lot of songs had drums that sounded really electronic, some kind of attempt to add just a little element of danceability to the set, but I kept wondering whether more traditional drumming would've done just as well.
Setlist:
Glass
Sleep alone
The wizard
Moon and moon
Horse and I
What's a girl to do
Daniel
Tahiti
Siren Song
Trophy
Two planets
Pearl's dream
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The Big Sleep
Wilderness
Prescilla
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