Parquet Courts

London The Roundhouse

Collectivism, autonomy and the chaos dimension.

Sometimes a band just comes of age. Which is what happens to Parquet Courts when they blitz the Roundhouse with the most visceral hard-core funk and woozy psychedelia this now gentrified railway shed has witnessed since the golden age of 70s punk rock.

Kicking off with latest album Wide Awake!’s irresistible anthem Total Football, inspired in part by the philosophy of Holland’s 1974 World Cup team, the Courts strike out. Drummer Max Savage’s metronomic beat pins Dust to the floor, where it’s swept on by deranged bassist Sean Yeaton, while brother A. Savage and Austin Brown hold a high-level instrumental summit in the brutal thrash medley Almost Had To Start A Fight/In And Out Of Patience that sends the audience crazy. So many tangents at work: the climate-change lament Before The Water Gets Too High comes from Texan roots with a possible nod to southern soul man Citizen Cope, but then the band’s Brooklyn-based side rears up in Dear Ramona, whose subject matter would appeal to anyone infatuated with the Velvet Underground’s Loaded. Maybe topping even those is Master Of My Craft, in which the twin guitars mesh like Television or Sonic Youth in their prime. Just before the final sonic blitzkrieg they drop Mardi Gras Beads, and the ghost of Syd Barrett is aboard.

As of now, Parquet Courts are untouchable.