elbow - paradiso - 250608

aka the night of the great piano disaster at the paradiso ... and a great night it was, no opener, which is more often the case nowadays, something i don't disapprove ... starting with starlings, with four band members on trumpet, working better than on cd (i once read in a review that the cats of the writer started fighting when hearing the song), followed by bones of you and leaders of the free world until the piano failed ... giving guy some time to answer questions of the audience, no, it's not their last record, jef's not present apparently, no beers after the show because they're straight off to glastonbury , rain and hot tea is the meaning of life, after which he took the opportunity to ask us things like what's the most peculiar you've done today (always sharp, the elbow frontman) ... with a fixed piano they started and transformed the paradiso in a giant mirror ball, with the help of sober and effective lighting ... newborn was superberb, with the guitar loop sucking you into the song and the singer howling like a wolf, which is when he's at his best, same with the loneliness of a tower crane driver ... then the encores, where they let the audience sing a song in stead of the common clapping and stamping, so before the last song we're asked what the sing, suds & soda just doesn't make it, in stead it'll be the final countdown, when the name of the person suggesting this proved to be to difficult to repeat, guy calls him jef, leading to someone immediately exclaiming "thanks a lot jef" ... but jef proved right, after they disappeared from the stage, the crowd starts cheering, and everywhere the final countdown theme is started, emerging to one big tu-tu-tu-tu tu-tu-tu-tu-tu ... which brought them back indeed, with guy commenting "being in a band lets you sometimes see the strangest things" ... some more fine tunes, after which they left with bigs smiles on the faces ... that is elbow, and warm they play ...