Maybeshewill – Sumo, Leicester - 16th December 2011 (Live Review)
Monday, 16 January 2012
Written by Ben Bland
Instrumentalists Maybeshewill have had, by all accounts, a pretty good 2011. They have completed numerous tours, always to acclaim from fans and critics alike, and released arguably their most complete record to date in “I Was Here for a Moment, Then I Was Gone”. It is therefore not surprising that they have chosen to end the year in a celebratory manner, in the form of two shows featuring the aforementioned third album in full complete with live strings.
Before the instrumentalists take the stage to a fairly large hometown crowd however, there is the small matter of a support set by soon to be splitting up post-mathy-indie types Cats & Cats & Cats. With a slightly elongated set due to the inability of These Furrows to perform as expected, their oddball eccentricity is rendered slightly mute due to poorly executed vocals. This is a shame because their music often threatens to be very interesting, even if at times it could do with being a little less deliberately obtuse.
Maybeshewill suffer from no such problems. With two parts of Her Name is Calla providing the strings, the quintet burst into their most recent opus and then proceeds not to put a foot wrong for the rest of its performance. Despite the recent addition of Matt Daly on keyboards and synthesizers, it seems that some of the music is still being programmed in rather than actually performed live, which is a shame but when a band performs an album as note perfect as Maybeshewill do tonight it seems overly picky to make a criticism of it. Guitarists John Helps and Robin Southby are the stars of the show of course. It is their ability to alternate between delicately picked swells and earth-shattering riffs that make Maybeshewill a special band and on the new album tracks such ability is clearly at its peak. The likes of “Relative Minors” and the thundering closer “To the Skies From a Hillside” showcase the talent of all members, including bassist Jamie Ward and drummer Jim Collins, to their full. Perhaps nowhere else in their discography is there such a perfect summation of the way the band sound on top form.
A brief departure from the stage is followed by a rather puzzling one song encore, of the band’s classic “He Films the Clouds Pt. 2”, before all troop off again…only to emerge once more for an extra two songs. This rather stop-start approach is a bit bizarre but fails to spoil things. Closer “Not for Want of Trying” is still the closest post-rock has ever come to call to arms anthem. As the band leave for the last time it is clear to all present that they have just witnessed not just one of the best instrumental bands in the game at the moment, but one of the best rock bands full stop. Very little music is as cinematic and powerful as Maybeshewill in full flight and Leicester should be very proud of them, especially on triumphant nights like this one.
“I Was Here for a Moment, Then I Was Gone” is out now.
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