The sumptuously glossy, hypersynthetic set – composed of rotating mirrored panels, a raised percussion platform and, initially, a sunset-pink glow – looks like a cross between a 1970s TV studio and a hotel lobby from 100 years later. At times the xx seem like a fictional band from a sci-fi film, some nerdy director’s alternative-universe fantasy of a group who enjoy mass adoration and pricey production, but, miraculously, create a subtle and complex blend of Cocteau Twins ethereality and New Order-style bass and beats instead of the usual pop slop.
Admittedly, the band seem that way when they are performing the still remarkably fresh-sounding hits (VCR, Crystalised, Intro) from their eponymous 2009 debut. A quiet revolution, the record felt like a wall of sound demolished, leaving beats, notes and shyly sung phrases strewn across an empty room. It was a mode that seemed, thrillingly, to strip the music of artifice. Inevitably, this revolt soon became a formula of its own: the insularity and restraint was turned into a pose, and the aesthetic mined by young pretenders and big pop producers.
The band’s third album, January’s I See You, saw them combat the cliches by beefing up their music with vocal samples, swapping enigmatic lyrics for more direct confessionals, and slackening their aesthetic uniformity; they seemed to be opening themselves up to the world. Indeed, despite this being a band who were as much about silence as noise, absence as presence, it would be hard to imagine a more sprawling, cluttered and generous iteration of a live show than this run of Brixton Academy gigs. The seven-night stint is not just a homecoming (the trio are all from south London), but a week-long maximalist extravaganza, comprised of after-parties, rotating support acts, a radio show, talks and guest-curated film programmes.
It’s true that I See You’s more conventional sound is not generally as captivating as their earlier work, although the vocal samples – Hall & Oates and Alessi Brothers among them – work exceptionally well live. On the record’s release, one critic snarkily compared Romy Madley Croft and Oliver Sim’s marginally less awkward cross-singing to the Beautiful South; if only their duetting were that entertaining. Yet the band do have tricks up their sleeve for amping up the fun factor: they dampen down the schmaltz on Brave for You via doom-laden production, Shelter is winningly disco-fied and Jamie xx interpolates Shanks & Bigfoot’s UK garage classic Sweet Like Chocolate into Chained.
Not that the crowd seem to register this clever and delightful blast from the past. Apart from diligently applauding riffs and basslines, they are mainly inert – one notable exception being when Jamie xx performs his club-concerned solo single Loud Places. It’s a reminder that, despite their increasingly outward looking sound, the xx still aren’t a band who lend themselves to communal enjoyment. Not that it’s stopped them creating a beautiful and accomplished stage show – even if it might have worked better beamed into the private havens of individual bedrooms, utopian sci-fi style.
- At the Brixton Academy, London, until 15 March. Box office: 0844-477 2000.
