Hot Chip: Brixton Academy – 06/11/08
The band weren't impressed by the contents of the giant christmas cracker
Hot Chip remind me of one thing and one thing only; thousands of smiling people in full fancy dress on a sun-strewn afternoon at Bestival 2006. And then again in 2007.
Perhaps, then, it was karma warning me when, in 2008, their set (although one of the highlights of the festival) was preceded by a particularly heavy downpour, the audience a crowd of mud-covered revellers in a sea of umbrellas and wellies. And right before THAT fateful Amy Winehouse set.
A few months later and I am mid-fight with a particularly rude man at Brixton Academy’s bar, the strains of the I’m-so-ironic-I’m-past-irony Max Tundra in the background. Karma, round two. And so, on to Hot Chip. Now, as much as I love their pretentious yet accessible electropop, for me, the confines of a large and darkened venue just does not suit them. Where is the sunshine? The outdoor space? Then general good feelings of a festival and party atmosphere? Whilst the more upbeat and known songs get them through, the slower numbers just fall a bit, well, flat and the audience start to look a little uninterested.
Don’t get me wrong, I still love Hot Chip. I just need to keep them in my happy place – sunshiney festivals. Roll on summer 2009 where I have no doubt they will be a Bestival headliner.
