Normally the words shoegaze, pop, 80s, rave and enjoyable shouldn’t be put next to each other, let alone used to describe the same 90 minutes. However, those are just the words we're going to use to describe last night’s M83 gig at London’s Scala.
Taking to a stage coveredwith enough cables to give even the most seasoned of electricians a heart attack, Anthony Gonzalez (who’s much smaller and more elflike in real life than I had realised…) made it clear it was his night, and with the help of a few supporting artists ploughed through an impressive selection of his work from the past 7 years.Naturally, the focus of the evening was on new album Saturdays=Youth, with tracks like Couleurs, Graveyard Girl and Kim & Jessie getting some of the biggest cheers of the night. However, whilst his new pop direction was the reason Scala was so packed, he didn’t forget the diehard fans from his early days (and there were a few…), throwing in some harder dancier numbers which culminated in the encore with an almost full-on rave. Well, for about 5 minutes.
Shoegaze was the theme of the evening really though, with many songs blurring into one, and for the casual fan it was easy to lose yourself in the music for 10 minutes, totally entranced by the meshing of layers of sounds.
M83 will be back in London in December, when you can find Anthony and co supporting the Kings of Leon.
