Photo: Mark McKay
This year has been massive for The Naked and Famous. The release of the album Passive Me, Aggressive You catapulted the band head first into a world tour that has not yet stopped to catch its breath.
But you couldn’t have guessed that from their perfomance tonight. The Naked and Famous maintained high energy levels throughout their performance, although at times they did appear to be simply going through the motions.
Playing arguably their best and most well known track ‘Punching in a Dream’ second was a brave decision but it paid off and the crowd were jumping to every beat. The best of their set comes when their influences of 1980’s synths and reverb forge an ambient union with contemporary electo beats on ‘Girls Like You’ and ‘No Way’.
Although there are plenty of killer moments during the set, there is perhaps twice as much filler and the singles are by far and away the most memorable. But if dream pop and shoegazing is your thing then The Naked and Famous are an enjoyable live band.
Their performance was flawless and tight. In stark contrast with the crowd, who were raptuous, The Naked and Famous wore a face of seriousness throughout the set. This made it difficult to know whether or not they were actually enjoying themselves and they seemed unwilling to interact with the crowd.
It was not until they return for their two song encore of that they say anything to the crowd at all. On the whole the band let their music do the talking and the anthemic ‘Young Blood’ provided a rousing end to their set that had the audience hanging off every lyric.
While the majority of the crowd were more than satisfied others remained less convinced. With a slightly re-ordered setlist and a second album The Naked and Famous could trim the fat from their performance and make the step from being a good band to see live to a great one.
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