The Afghan Whigs at Koko

The Afghan Whigs
Oupa
Koko, 19 August 2012

Damn Dulli. I really don't know how you do it. 

There was a moment during tonight's show, during the instrumental middle of Fountain & Fairfax (the above clip) where it sounded so perfect and special that I felt myself close to tears. Given all the hundreds of shows I've been to and how few times that has actually happened to me, probably only three or four times in all, that should give you some idea of how incredible and moving and fun this gig was.

Even though it seems like the last 10 years has been the decade of the reunion (no doubt due to the rise in illegal downloading), I really didn't think we'd ever see the Afghan Whigs reunited, probably due to the fact that Greg Dulli shot down the notion in every interview where he was asked but in reality it wasn't too far-fetched given that, like Soundgarden, the guys in the band were actually all still friends. Still it was a huge surprise after Dulli's success with his post-Whigs band The Twilight Singers and collaboration with friend Mark Lanegan, The Gutter Twins, when it was announced late last year and obviously, having seen the Whigs at their best and worst back many times back in the 90s, I was keen to see them again and find out if that old magic was still there.

And you know, everything that made the Afghan Whigs so wonderful is still there except they seem even tighter and more assured these days. Certainly Dulli himself is in superb form, for one thing he looks better than he has in years: slim, healthy and handsome, even compared to the last time I saw him, where he was looking well, it actually takes me back just how good he looks. The rest of the band are faring well too, with bassist John Curley looking trimmer than ever and Rick McCollum (hiding away on the far side of the stage on the left) looking smart in a suit and cap. 

Beginning, rather beautifully, with the cinematic Crime Scene Part One, which slowly builds, keeping us in anticipation until it storms into the loud riffs of I'm Her Slave, the party then gets into full swing with 1965 track Uptown Again, which has a sexy Prince-style groove. In fact Dulli made sure we were in no doubt of the influence of Prince, one of his heroes, on their music, with 66 slipping into Little Red Corvette and later their epic Faded powerfully turning into Purple Rain at the very end. But that of course is one of things Dulli is so masterful at: taking snippets of great songs and slipping them into his own, such as when the gloriously self-loathing attack of When We Two Parted seamlessly turns into Drake's Over My Dead Body or in the middle of the grunge sludge of You My Flower, Dulli tells us how last night he found the perfect song to sing within it, the delicate Sail To The Moon by Radiohead, which amazingly fits right in before he returns to his own song's main chorus. Then of course there's Omerta, which pays homage to The Beatles' She Loves You, so of course ends on a singalong refrain of "yeah, yeah, yeah" while Bulletproof morphs into The Supremes' Where Did Our Love Go, all sounding perfectly natural and wonderful, like it belonged there all along.

Dulli doesn't just fit snippets of other people's songs into his own, he also is a masterful interpreter and the first new material from the Whigs in 13 years have been two new covers offered for free on their website and both are played tonight. My favourite of the two, the rather timely cover of Frank Ocean's Lovecrimes with Dulli on keyboards, sounds cool and groove-ridden as expected but surprisingly, for me, it's the cover of Marie Queenie Lyons' See And Don't See that really packs a punch, but then the Whigs always had a knack for taking old soul songs and making them their own.

Dulli (I really don't mean to keep going on about him as the rest of the band are superb, but he really is the focal point here) is not only back to good health and good looks but he's also got back some of that sassyness he had appeared to have lost in recent years asking those in the balcony to "please have sex up there, I wanna see those ecstasy faces" before telling a story of a couple in the front row who really did go at it during a show and Dulli mistakenly for a while thought it was him up on stage who was turning her on. He also playfully ribs Rick McCollum when second guitarist Dave Rosser (from The Twilight Singers who is joining them on this tour) starts playing licks and encouraging a guitar battle between them, which McCollum shyly declines partaking in (a little bit cruel but typically Dulli). He also wiggles and shakes his ass and acts like the grooving, soul-loving Dulli of old. It's fantastic and a whole lot of fun to see.

The set is just a brilliant mix of old favourites: a couple from Up In It (You My Flower and a stomping Son Of The South), just one from Congregation disappointingly (I'm Her Slave) and the majority culled from Black Love and their masterpiece, Gentlemen, which to be fair was as expected. One of the best moments though comes from the two they play from their final album, 1965, a song I had never given much attention to before, the sultry Citi Soleil, which saw Dulli out from behind his guitar and taking the microphone down to the crowd encouraging us to sing along to the "Ooh child, I'll meet you child, on the sunny side, it's alright, alright!" chorus, which gets an enthusiastic response and sounds fantastic with the band in full groove and the crowd singing along like they had never been away.

The superb encore of Bulletproof, Summer's Kiss and the aforementioned magnificent Faded, which builds beautifully and movingly, surely the perfect song to end any concert, just leave the crowd howling for more, but really you couldn't get a more perfect ending than that. I've seen a mixed bunch of reunions in recent years, some fueled by nostalgia, some obviously just for the money, some you can tell are just fun, but none seem more natural than The Afghan Whigs exhilarating reunion. I really hope this isn't the end for them.

A small note about the opening act Oupa, which is the solo project of Yuck frontman Daniel Blumberg. Yuck have always worn their 90s influences on their sleeve and Oupa is no different, with Blumberg sounding a little like a stripped down, lo-fi Mercury Rev or My Bloody Valentine, with him alone on stage playing just a guitar to a minimal backing track. Truthfully, at times it was a little boring but there were definite moments of inspiration, enough to get me intrigued and I'll definitely be checking out his solo album thanks to seeing him tonight.