{"id":12457,"date":"2024-09-26T14:06:00","date_gmt":"2024-09-26T13:06:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/?p=12457"},"modified":"2024-09-26T14:06:00","modified_gmt":"2024-09-26T13:06:00","slug":"los-campesinos-new-century-hall-reviewed-by-sam-lamplugh","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/?p=12457","title":{"rendered":"Los Campesinos! | New Century Hall | Reviewed by Sam Lamplugh"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Los Campesinos! demonstrate their cross-generational, sing-able indie appeal<\/em><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/los-campesinos.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"400\" height=\"351\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong>Los Campesinos! supported by ME REX | New Century Hall, Manchester | 22<sup>nd<\/sup> September 2024<\/strong><br \/><strong>Reviewed by Sam Lamplugh<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Millennials and Gen Z don\u2019t get on, apparently. Or so I\u2019m told, to co-opt a lyric from Los Campesinos!, who played their first show in Manchester for seven years at New Century Hall on Sunday, by \u201cpeople I\u2019ve nothing but trust in.\u201d However, the mingling queue of block-fringed teenagers and greying adults at the merch stand (a queue this writer joined at an apparent juncture only to find snaked through three repetitions before its true end point) is an early indicator that, here at least, the conflict is overstated: advertiser\u2019s hoodoo; a false flag of difference, masking what is shared and therefore actually meaningful.<\/p>\n<p>The queue shrinks slightly when the opening band, London three-piece ME REX, burst into the first of several well-received and shapely bangers, Empty Country-reminiscent guitar licks chatting with \u00a1Forward Russia! synth tones and layered with Haim-adjacent harmonised vocals gamely shouted back by a good chunk of the audience, younger and older alike. A fun gig game is to identify those who are there for the support band: one bespectacled suburban dad at the centre made for an easy victory in this case, his voice like a fourth vocalist, the lost REXle, bobbing head constant and hands madly gesticulating throughout. When the guitarist wryly remarks that \u201cthis is probably going to be the biggest crowd we\u2019ll ever play to,\u201d I wonder briefly if there\u2019s some fine gauze between band and audience we can\u2019t see, blocking their view. Even so, they must surely have heard their fourth vocalist\u2019s reply, succinctly boomed across the floor: \u201cBollocks!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>ME REX are only nine years old in band years (the same as human years, only gleaned exclusively from Wikipedia and ignorant of much of the long negotiating period which inevitably presages any actual songs). Time enough for them yet, particularly considering the lifespan of the main act, who released their seventh album in July, the self-released <em>All Hell<\/em>, sixteen years since their 2008 debut and indie benchmark <em>Hold on Now, Youngster<\/em>, back in the days when \u2018austerity\u2019 was a low-scoring waste of Scrabble letters as opposed to a failed Tory project and the dark heart of a new, nominally Labour government.<\/p>\n<p>Los Campesinos! have always been attuned to the politics of protest, lead singer Gareth David\u2019s lyrics a snaking map of self-reference, obscure football ephemera and barbs orbiting the interpersonal cost of governmental cruelty, and it is perhaps this lyrical consistency across the band\u2019s output which holds onto older fans who have otherwise shed the angsty guitar music of their youth while also attracting a new crowd of freshly-disaffected youngsters, just beginning to understand the extent to which things are stacked against them. The seven members of the band mount a stage bedecked in banners demanding rights and healthcare for trans folk; equity for all and justice for Gaza: their packed assemblage, strength in numbers in a small space, adds gravity and heft to the proceedings. Songs about love, loss, and prescription drugs become grand, hopeful and fun when echoed among a crowd that replies with a single voice to every line.<\/p>\n<p>The primary verb for every Los Campesinos! gig crowd I have ever been part of, from Birmingham in 2008 to Manchester a few days ago, is \u2018bellow.\u2019 When a new album comes out, it\u2019s exciting to see whether the lyrics you\u2019ve been bellowing in your head are the same chosen by a crowd, and \u2018A Psychic Wound,\u2019 from <em>All Hell<\/em>, barely four months old and the band\u2019s opener, releases the first of the night within thirty seconds, as we are all \u201cTied to the pulse of the sea\u201d. From there, the crowd is one, through a dizzying hour and a half of near-constant music, each line bellowed by someone somewhere, uniting like cresting waves for old mainstays (the \u201cit seems unfair\u201d refrain of 2017\u2019s \u2018I Broke Up in Amarante\u2019; the as-true-now-as-then \u201cI think we need more post-coital and less post-rock\u201d of 2009\u2019s \u2018Straight in at 101\u2019; the mournful \u201cgoodbye courage, hello sadness again\u201d of 2011\u2019s \u2018Hello Sadness&#8217;). The band knows this, they make space for it, but there is none of the microphone-brandished-into audience mouths posturing of other acts, instead pure performance; seasoned professionals at the top of their game.<\/p>\n<p>After fourteen songs, Gareth announces that the remainder of the set will be \u201cwall-to-wall bangers.\u201d A familiar voice responds from the centre of the crowd, the fourth member of the opening act now absorbed into the unitary mass: \u201cThey\u2019re all bangers!\u201d At the bar, a mum-and-dad pair styled Oasis-ly raise eyebrows in surprise at their own enjoyment, won round by their teenage daughter\u2019s new favourite band. To the Gen Z fans, I say: thanks for helping my favourite band keep going. And to their parents, the Gen Xers and Boomers who are supposed to hate me in turn, I say: see you at the next one, where you can bellow along with the rest of us and feel, for a little while, that maybe what unites is stronger than that which divides.<\/p>\n<p><em>Los Campesinos! continue their tour in Bristol on September 27<sup>th<\/sup>, followed by further dates in Brighton and Birmingham, supported throughout by ME REX. <\/em><\/p>\n<p>All Hell <em>is available through Heart Swells, and ME REX\u2019s most recent EP <\/em>Smilodon <em>is available through BSM Records.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Reviewed by Sam Lamplugh<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Los Campesinos! demonstrate their cross-generational, sing-able indie appeal Los Campesinos! supported by ME REX | New Century Hall, Manchester | 22nd September 2024Reviewed by Sam Lamplugh Millennials and Gen Z don\u2019t get on, apparently. Or so I\u2019m told, to co-opt a lyric from Los Campesinos!, who played their first show in Manchester for seven years [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":45,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":[]},"categories":[15,283],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v20.2.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Los Campesinos! | New Century Hall | Reviewed by Sam Lamplugh - The Manchester Review<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.themanchesterreview.co.uk\/?p=12457\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Los Campesinos! | New Century Hall | Reviewed by Sam Lamplugh - The Manchester Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Los Campesinos! demonstrate their cross-generational, sing-able indie appeal Los Campesinos! supported by ME REX | New Century Hall, Manchester | 22nd September 2024Reviewed by Sam Lamplugh Millennials and Gen Z don\u2019t get on, apparently. 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