Bit behind with reviews but two recent gigs at the Bristol O2 Academy were (in chronological order) Janell Monae and The Decemberists. Both were very enjoyable, both started with a spoken voiceover intro and both lapsed slightly into self-indulgence. But there the similarities ended. Janell Monae toured following her showy debut album "The Archandroid" and was determined to put on a visual spectacle, complete with back projection, wandering spooky cowled zombie-like figures wearing Scream masks, and even painting during one song. This together with delays for costume changes somewhat detracted from the music and Janell's strong vocals. Unfortunately, the show lacked a good sense of pacing and these breaks didn't help, what was already a short set. When it was good though - "Cold War"' "Tightrope" - it was very good, but the ambition behind the show somewhat exceeded the grasp. 4/5.
The Decemberists had more of a back catalogue to draw on and did so, although enough selections from current album "The King Is Dead" made it into the set - a two hour long set at that - even though "June Hymn" was only the second encore. There was humorous interplay between Colin Melloy and the crowd to start with which warmed up the atmosphere, and as the show went on, the interplay and skitting between band members gave a warm atmosphere. It did descend a little bit into self-indulgence at the end of the set with a long quasi-blues number seeing the drummer come forward to the front, a girl come up from the crowd to play slide guitar, but the encore of the "Mariner's Revenge Song" saw them win the crowd back. And it made me rush out and order up the back catalogue albums I didn't have!! 4.5/5
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