The Afghan Whigs at the Electric Ballroom

The Afghan Whigs
Ed Harcourt
Electric Ballroom, 15 July 2014

It was a pleasant surprise to see Ed Harcourt announced as the support act for tonight's show especially since he could easily pack the Electric Ballroom out on his own. He's a longtime pal of Greg Dulli though and they've played together many times over the years, so I guess that's why, also given the amount of new material in his set tonight I would imagine it's also a good no-fuss testing ground for his new songs. I actually had seen Harcourt before but years ago, back when his first album, the Mercury-nominated Here Be Monsters, came out. I did really like that album at the time (still do in fact) and I remember him being a great live act but I must admit I haven't really kept up with his music since then. It surprised me to discover that he's released five more albums since then and produced and co-wrote Sophie Ellis-Bextor's latest album, Wanderlust, so he's obviously been doing alright without me.

When he arrives on stage he does look older than I remembered but then it's been 13 years since I saw him in concert, he also sounds way heavier than he did back then. The first song he plays on a beautiful Gretsch guitar before reverting to keyboards (which is the instrument I would associate him with). Not that this made things more poppy mind you, as Harcourt and his band played a pretty rocking set throughout. Obviously, since it was material he was debuting from his forthcoming seventh album, Time Of Dust, I wasn't familiar with the songs but it did all sound pretty good. At the very end he threw me a bone and played one I did know, Beneath The Heart Of Darkness, from his first LP, which, like the record, started off sadly sweet before descending into the incredible noise in the middle. It certainly woke everyone up, that's for sure and set things up nicely for the main event.

It's debatable whether the current line-up of the band is really even The Afghan Whigs any more as since the departure of guitarist Rick McCollum the only original members left now are bassist John Curley and of course Greg Dulli. But it's funny, as soon as Dulli and the gang stepped on stage, none of that seemed to matter at all. This is still the Whigs as long as Dulli is there and Curley, without a doubt, also adds something special. And to be honest, other than Dave Rosser who has been playing guitar with Dulli for years now in his various musical projects, I find that I don't even care that much who else is on stage with him because Dulli is such a magnetic, powerful presence it's hard to take your eyes off him.

They start with two of the most intense songs from the recently released To Do The Beast, the band's first record in 16 years and the crowd just go crazy from the first note (or the first sight of a grinning Dulli walking on stage if I'm honest). The sound is savage, exhilarating and utterly thrilling. It feels just like seeing the band back in the 90s and that's incredibly rare, especially for a reunited band, to feel like you are still seeing them in their prime. The new songs also fit in perfectly with the classic material so when they bring out great tracks like Fountain And Fairfax and Going To Town and then switch back to something from To Do The Beast like The Lottery, it feels absolutely seamless.

Amusingly Dulli announces they are going to play a cover and then proceeds to play On The Corner by The Twilight Singers, his post-Whigs band, but of course it just sounds the same, if not better than ever. There are plenty of genuine covers though, at least snippets of them, in fact I don't think I've ever been to a Dulli show where he hasn't thrown in a few lines or more from songs that he loves. Tonight is no exception with the most thrilling for me being a slowed down, sleazy version of Fleetwood Mac's Tusk at the end of I Am Fire and almost all of Heaven On Their Minds, the song Judas sings in Jesus Christ Superstar (I cannot even tell you of my love for the soundtrack to the 70s film) which has Dulli spitting out the words and screaming "Jesus!" like the Devil had taken over him. It was absolutely incredible and an unforgettable moment. Dulli loves Jesus Christ Superstar, he grew up listening to it, and I've see him play songs from it before, namely The Temple (which is actually on the Whigs' album Congregation) and the instrumental verion of The Thirty-Nine Lashes, but this one had them all beat by far. It also beautifully segued into the Whigs' own Somethin' Hot, which had the sweaty crowd all singing along.

There's no doubt the new songs sounded fantastic but even if it was just nostalgia it was extremely exciting to hear all those songs I loved so much back in the 90s. In particular Gentlemen sounded as vicious as ever and My Enemy, with it's killer opening line ("I heard the whispers, baby, if what they say is true, they say I killed a brother to fall in love with you") has never sounded so menacing. Even after all these years Dulli's music still exists in this dark, powerful, intense place that can be frightening and thrilling to visit but you are glad Dulli can sing to you about them so you don't have to live there. At the end there's a hopeful note though when Dulli puts down his guitar and takes the microphone to the front of the stage, looking part preacher and part tempting demon, to sing The Beatles' Getting Better and you really do believe that things are going well for him at the moment and the band is sounding better than ever.

I would have been more than happy with that, even though they had missed a couple of my favourite songs, but as if living up to the words of Paul McCartney's song, they came back and performed a disturbingly good Debonair (much better than I saw them last in fact) and Dulli's own Purple Rain, the rousing Faded which again included snippets of another song, this time Bobby Womack's Across 110th Street. I really don't know how they do it but they never fail to blow me away.