As The Wedding Present jangle their way into I Am Not Going To Fall In Love With You, the moshing and crowd surfing kick off again. Nothing surprising there. The front rows at Shepherd’s Bush Empire have barely stood still since the first notes of set opener Interstate 5. And one particularly tenacious punter’s been airborne, much to David Gedge’s amusement, most of the time since Brassneck. That was at least 45 minutes ago.
What’s surprising though is I Am Not Going To Fall In Love With You was originally released in 2022. Usually by this point in a band’s career (38 years and counting for Gedge’s group), new songs mean one thing: a trip to the bar for another overpriced pint. But not tonight. All the tracks taken from 24 Songs, a collection of the seven-inch singles issued at monthly intervals last year, are greeted almost as enthusiastically as the classics from three decades ago.
That’s testament to the songs themselves, the enthusiasm with which they’re performed tonight, and the fans’ love for a band seemingly unable to coast. Gedge especially is all-in throughout, delivering particularly emotive lyrics with closed eyes, fists clenched, arms tensed behind his head. There are even times he stands tiptoed to get even closer to the microphone picking up his always incisive, often heartbreaking, lyrics. And then there’s the guitar playing: thrashing at the strings at such a rate that his hands seem to blur; wandering over to jam with beanied guitarist Jon Stewart (of Sleeper); adopting that iconic head down, legs wide apart stance for particularly impassioned solos; vigorously swinging his instrument during Corduroy to eke out every last bit of feedback.
The intensity of his performance is paired with an obvious joy and sense of fun shared by all four musicians. Gedge delights in telling bass player and backing singer Melanie Howard about Shepherd’s Bush and the famous TV shows recorded at the venue. After a particularly vigorous run through the particularly vigorous Give My Love To Kevin, My Favourite Dress, Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me), and Kennedy — without pausing for breath between songs — he declares: “I’m getting too old for this.” (After a beat, as if prompting the audience, he jokingly adds: “Oh no you’re not.”) But perhaps best of all is how he thanks the crowd for booing after announcing the set’s last song, which turns out to be an especially raucous Flying Saucer complete with soaring instrumental end that makes the album version sound pedestrian rather than interstellar.
Like everything else tonight, it’s delivered with both precision and passion: the band sound incredibly tight, but not over-rehearsed to the point of soulless perfection. The old songs (like A Million Miles, No, and You Should Always Keep In Touch With Your Friends) aren’t ravaged by the passage of time. Nothing’s been slowed down, undergone changes in key, or lost its lustre by repetition over the years. And the new songs completely come alive on stage. Go Go Go, a duet with Howard, bounds along like a single from a band’s debut album. Astronomic, featuring some stellar vocal harmonies, emphasises its loud-quiet dynamic tonight, while We Interrupt Our Programme hurtles along at breakneck speed.
We All Came From The Sea introduces a metronomic backing track, leaving drummer Nicholas Wellauer to play the congas and Howard a wood block, but still manages to swing more than almost anything else on offer. Monochrome is staggeringly beautiful, beginning with Gedge almost whispering “And every day spent without you/ Just becomes so monochrome/ There’s no colour/ Life’s just duller” over dreamy instrumentation. Of course the drums and big guitars kick in eventually, but the vocals remain tragically tender throughout. And Science Fiction uses a bouncy pretty melody to mask lines like “We broke up but I still call your name, like I do every day” that only sound more devastating when delivered in person.
These are songs that, like The Wedding Present themselves, are meant to be experienced live. When experienced in conjunction with fabulous support act Miki Berenyi playing a selection of glorious Lush classics (including Light From A Dead Star and Baby Talk) and shimmering tracks like V.O. and Vertigo by her other group Piroshka, this is an experience to be cherished.
The Wedding Present
Shepherd’s Bush Empire, London
19th May 2023
Photo: Naomi Dryden-Smith
- This article originally appeared on Louder Than War.
Nils van der Linden 