The Kills – Brixton Academy, London
Never mind the cooler-than-thou image, the blues-punk duo know how to sock it to a crowd
Words Chloe Warnock
The Kills sauntered back onto the scene in 2011 with Blood Pressures, an album that saw them shifting focus away from the glitchy patterns of Midnight Boom in favour of dark, psychedelic twists on their trademark brooding, bruising blues rock. As you would expect from the nonchalant caners, it’s not one for those of a prudish disposition.
Tonight at Brixton Academy, the backdrop is a wall of leopard print, and the lights are predominantly scarlet red, making alluring silhouettes of bed-headed veterans Alison Mosshart and Jamie Hince. The former has a contemplative swagger about her, highly charged and strutting around like a fitful banshee, she hocks up a spit across the stage before taking to the mic for opener ‘Future Starts Slow’. Hince is more subdued in his movement, merely fidgeting on the spot, all thrusting blunt riffs and underlying vocals to Mosshart’s fierce and husky howl. Whilst his playing style makes it look as if the guitar is a living thing; he busts out the final chords of ‘Baby Says’ by holding his contraption to the side, and beating the strings with his fist as if he were striking a gong.
For added clout, tonight the pair brings a set of four handkerchief-masked drummers, allowing the rhythms they produce to be felt with thunderous impact on tracks such as ‘URA Fever’, and especially in the military-style of drumming of ‘Fuck The People’, from their 2003 debut Keep on Your Mean Side, which reminds us of nothing so much as Adam Ant’s ‘Kings of The Wild Frontier’ and draws middle-finger salutes from the crowd during the chorus. When a group of robed gospel singers takes to the stage, the crowd gasps in bewilderment and concern, perhaps, that we’re not about to witness something totally cringe- worthy and pretentious. On the contrary, however, they actually give things a slightly sinister edge — most notably during ‘Satellite’, in which the choir provides spooky backing to the pacey riffs and thumping drums going on at the front of the stage.
Whilst the duo’s devil-may-care attitude offstage has been mistaken for arrogance in the past, The Kills’ raw passionate energy in the live setting — Mosshart in particular is an eccentric she-wolf whose claws we’d happily die under — puts paid to the notion that this pair are too cool to properly sock it to a crowd.
Photograph by Kyle Dean Reinford
