The Horrors at Rich Mix

25 March 2009

I’ve written much praise about The Horrors and their forthcoming album, ‘Primary Colours’ already and it’s been quite gratifying to see that I’m not the only one with that opinion – it really seems to have turned peoples perceptions around (witness the Quietus track by track review for example).

Two quotes I’ve heard stand out (although the first is flagrant hyperbole):

“Strange House [the first album] is their ‘Pablo Honey’”

“They’ve finally got the music to match their look.”

So it’s with that weight of expectation I journeyed down to Rich Mix in East London to see their ‘launch gig’. As is the norm with this kind of thing it was half full of industry types (see Conor McNicholas of the NME’s twitters for example) but I don’t think that really mattered too much – it was a gig that was always going to have a separation between band and crowd as none of them will have heard any of the songs (bar Sea Within A Sea) before.

If anything it created a slightly charged atmosphere – it’s rare you get a set of more passionate fans then Horrors fans (the confirm – on the whole – quite nicely to the teenage goth-ish stereotypes) so to present them with a set full of songs they don’t know, which are quite a progression from the previous album, is quite an enticing prospect. It’ll be interesting to see how much of their existing fanbase stays along for the ride.

The new songs sounded excellent live, which was always going to be a challenge as it’s quite a ‘studio’ album, with lots of stuff going on. They translate very nicely, however, although it was obvious that given a little more time on the road they’ll sound even better. A great gig, then, but more like a portent of things to come.