Fanfarlo returned to London for their much anticipated gig at the ICA.  Touted for a long while as a ‘one to watch’, the fivesome (six tonight, with the assistance of London folkie Jeremy Walmsley) have just released their opening album Reservoir to generally great reviews and, backed by the ICA’s formidable impressive lightshow, exuded confidence in their ascending status.

 
With an abundance of xlyophones, trumpets, keyboards and more littering the stage they ripped into ‘Ghosts’, a great choice of opener with its driving keys and drums.  Its a lot louder than on record, and their sound has more in common with rousing sound of Arcade Fire and the folkie troubadour-ing I’d been expecting.

     
Album opener ‘I’m a Pilot’ follows and, not for the first time in the evening, features a gorgeous 5 person harmony that will have Fleet Foxes fans weak at the knees.  It is impossible not to
like, and they make a compelling spectacle throughout with most members swapping instruments more than once; lead singer Simon lurching around the stage, and all of them looking like they are genuinely having a ball.

    
‘Drowning Men’ ups the scope with its gorgeous violins, and has the band tootling across the stage with something approaching
abandon as Simon shows that his voice can soar as well as drawl. ‘Finish Line’ is then ecstatically received by the crowd, with its just so xylophone the perfect background to the rock-out it precedes.  A real highlight from the album, they do the very rare and make it a better experience with its epic breakdown in the middle where, bathed in a non-sinister red light they all ‘ahhhhhhhhh’ as one into their mics, before the tension
snaps with some more glorious trumpets.


‘Comets’ is as gentle a delight as you’d wish, with its lyric of ‘cry murder, cry for your life’, if not quite making me shed a tear, making me think that it would be the sort of song that
would if some really bad news had wended its way that day. Then the surprise of the night; I’d been most looking forward to ‘Harold T. Wilkins' and ‘Finish Line’, but it is the tuneless humming of ‘The Walls Are Coming Down’ that tickles the ears
of those unfortunate enough to share a tube carriage with me later that evening.  Opening with all members chanting the chorus
as the stage it really brings to mind the best moments of Arcade Fire live.  It’s inspiring, a mood-lifter and demanded-and got- a sing-a-long from the audience.


They finished the set in the crowd, with an unplugged acoustic  version ‘In The Aeroplane Over The Sea’.  Although a nice enough thing to do, I actually felt it was a somewhat muted end to proceedings.  But that is mere nitpickings really, as Fanfarlo
deliver massively as a live band and are highly engaging throughout .  Folk is big news at the moment, the antithesis of the burgeoning electro sounds barging their way in at the more
trendy end of the music scene.  These are a more poppy proposition than artists such as Mumford And Sons,
Fleet Foxes et al and, while its unlikely they will make the same global impact as Arcade Fire (who it is nigh on impossible to avoid comparing them to), they deserve their shot at the big time as they are a frequently fantastic band.

Posted In Live Reviews, Jun 03 2009. Words - David