David Emery Online

Beirut by the river

25 June 2007

“On Monday 25th June, fresh from his appearance at Glastonbury’s Jazz World Stage (Sunday 24th @ 6.40pm) and as a rather original warm-up for his sold out gig the following evening at London’s Koko, Zach and co. will be performing a FREE acoustic gig on London’s South Bank. “

This was how tonight’s festivities were billed, and – simply put – it was a truly amazing gig. There was a “spark” in the air – the band themselves were obviously having a wail of a time, and professed that they were making it up as they went along which suited me and the rest of the crowd just fine.

I’ve written about Beirut before, and live he is every bit as good as on record, backed by a superb troupe of musicians that manage to capture the essence of the record – both slightly ramshackle, but beautiful all at the same time. Near the end of the set most of the band walked out into the audience to play a traditional eastern European folk song – I’m not sure how many gigs that kind of audience interaction would really work; it truly was a special moment.

Luckily I get to see it all again tomorrow when he headlines a sold-out show at Koko in Camden – it’ll be interesting to see how it compares.