The XX and Holly Miranda Live

Holly Miranda was the best opener I have ever seen at a gig. She was completely unknown to me, but proved herself as an artist to look out for and she managed to impress everyone in the room, not just me, which is a rare thing to happen. It was simply made up of Holly, her guitarist, bells and a really old mic. She would switch between the normal mic, to the older one, in and out through the songs and occasionally loop her vocals (with the old mic’s sound reminding me of the one from Yellow Submarine by The Beatles). But what really made their concert so interesting was the use of effects. Holly would keep the basic riffs and the rhythm, and her backup guitarist would come in with every effect you can think of (harsh blues distortion, dreamy swirls and ultra clean sounds), and always playing with the style that best fit his effect. The mp3s I found online give her live sound no justice at all, so here is a youtube link instead. I hope she goes into this direction more with her studio sound, because it is breathtaking to listen to.

The XX opened by illuminating the crowd with their giant glowing “x”s and bombarding them with the engulfing bass drone of Intro. With a few wonky notes, they took a while to warm up. It was a shame, because they played my favourite track Crystalized second, and it felt very sloppy. However, they really hit their stride towards the middle of the concert; with the songs far out passing their debut. Towards the end, Infinty and Night Time recieved elongated instrumental outros which were wonderful to bear witness to. Though I can’t say they were spectacular, they created a great atmosphere and really helped me appreciate their debut album so much more, with the best example being Stars, the highlight of my evening.

More pictures can be found here.