Art Brut – Barfly, Cambridge, 28/01/08

30 January 2008, 07:50 | Written by Rich Hughes

(Live)

It didn’t start well. As Art Brut triumphantly mounted the stage at the front of a packed Barfly, a smoke machine billowed out its wares to an unsuspecting band and public. As the first chords of ‘Pump Up The Volume’ rang out, the entire venue was filled with smoke, the machine seemingly intent on drowning everyone out, including poor Eddie Argos who couldn’t find his microphone stand. As the second verse began, now including Argos’ drawl, the crowd finally responded. The song finished and Argos apologised. In the thick fog, now falling away, he couldn’t find the microphone stand to start the song. And this was all after the rather dire set by A Human, who were fronted by a man who could only be described as a sinister mix of Richie from Bottom and your drunken Uncle at a Wedding lecherously peering at the young girls.

But anyway, all these thoughts were quickly banished from my mind during this storming set by one of the UK’s most energetically entertaining bands I’ve seen for a long time. The entire band operates like a collective party machine, feeding off each others energy and performance. Argos is the focal point of everything. Leading the band with his “Are you ready Art Brut?” before launching into another one of his twisted tales of love, disappointment, impotence and forming a band.

It’s an inspiring evening. You can’t help but be bowled over by their exuberance. Argos is watched in a reverential awe. Towards the end of the show, during ‘Direct Hit’, the crowd lift him aloft like some bronzed God waiting to be worshiped. It almost gets too much for the poor man himself, as he has to drift to a ballad next to regain his breathe and have a rest.

The evening is, perhaps unsurprisingly, littered with plenty of humour. There are flashes of covers interspersed throughout the set, snatches of ‘There Is A Light That Never Goes Out’ and ‘Rehab’, the latter morphed into a plea for Winehouse to go there for help. The end of ‘Bang Bang Rock ‘n Roll’ is also altered to “Amy Winehouse, stay off the crack!”. There’s even an update on ‘Emily Kane’; Argos divulges that he met her last night for a drink. But, unfortunately for him, she’s now got a boyfriend. Who’s a nice man.

In the end however Argos needn’t have worried. Tonight he’s wooed the entire crowd. He could take anyone home tonight, even one of the boys. As he marched into the crowd at the start of the set, forming bands with groups of random people, everyone now came out of the venue actually wanting to form a band. We’ve formed a band – it’ll never work, but it doesn’t matter; we’ve formed a band.