The Peel Sessions Live
Queen Elizabeth Hall, The South Bank Centre, London
3 June 1999
The ongoing, haphazard selection by John Peel for his live Sessions continues with the welcome return of Stereolab to live performance after an absence of a year or so. Peel compères in his usual style, jovial, knowing, knowledgable and slightly diffident, broadcasting (hopefully) the existence of the Neoist Necrocard to a national radio audience. Stereolab take the stage to a rapturous welcome, and it’s like it always was – the arrangement of synth, bass, guitar and drums in an array of joyous power drawn from the sheer beauty of these instruments, these people.
So maybe their forays into Easy Listening kitsch have been some kind of prog-lounge journey worthy of some concern for their dubious Muzak propensities; unfortunately, they fail on two levels, that of interest or engagement, and on their former proud boast to be “still not professional”. When the smooth near-pop haze clears though, and new material kicks in with a garage-Hawkwind–motorik fuzzy pulse, all is right with the gig again. No matter that the shiny songs are nice, and mellow and pleasant; they’re frankly dull too, when the mood demands Moog squirts and drones, and the furious skree of a spontaneously fragmenting guitar.
Still, it’s not too long before all the latter, and more, blasts away into the ionosphere the cobwebs of the auditorium, and the traditional encore of “Super Electric” unwinds its electronic coils with a space rock intensity which bodes well for their next album. Indeed, all this knob-twiddling psychedelia is all the rage again, and so much the better. Stereolab were always a band to lose your mind to, to surrender to the rush of post-Neu! acceleration, the submerge in the slightly distant, heady intellectualism of the subtly barbed lyrics and the body-pleasing surge of electricity wiring up the sound for the endless moment of noise and melody combined. Tonight, Stereolab remember the perfect prescription half the time at least, and anything else is forgiveable too.
-Antron S. Meister-
