An evening of technical hitches and soaring pop
MGMT Electric Brixton ★★★★★
Ten years ago, the Technicolor thrill of Connecticut electro indie duo MGMT was the soundtrack to every festival’s hazy, rain-soaked final thrust. The melodic hits of their 2007 debut, Oracular
Spectacular, saw them hailed as the future of rock, but they never fulfilled that promise; their two succeeding albums shifted towards an eccentric, insular sound that lost them favour with radio, but kept a loyal tribe of devotees. The band’s fourth record
Little Dark Age, released on Friday, returns to hooky, psychedelic synthpop, and was given an early outing at Electric Brixton on Tuesday night.
On a cramped, cluttered stage, lead vocalist Andrew Vanwyngarden was all shaggy hair and sparse, gentle chatter; the bespectacled Ben Goldwasser sprang from the balls of his feet over the keyboard.
In a burst of red strobe lights, the sombre Little Dark Age opened the show, a pleasingly gloomy contrast to the duo’s halcyon hits. Other new songs were accompanied with onstage quirks: Vanwyngarden mounted an exercise bike for the Eighties pump of She Works Out Too Much, while the pair crouched over miniature instruments for When You’re Small. The wit seemed to be lost on some in the crowd. Much better received was the creeping, melancholy TSLAMP (Time Spent Looking At My Phone), which paired zany electronica with an urgent flamenco guitar.
Inevitably, it was during the soaring pop hits that the duo shone brightest. Frustrating technical nuisances that punctuated the night left fans with a protracted jungle-sounds recording before the band were finally able to launch into Electric Feel, but they didn’t dampen its rousing whoosh and thud. Party anthem Kids was perfection – as exciting, inventive and breathless as if heard for the first time. If only such verve had been sustained throughout the evening.