Even on a cold, mid-November night and having been given the wrong type of tickets, nothing could ruin a mesmeric night where Yannis & co. were simply sublime.
The incompetence of the ticketing service Crowdsurge who Foals use on their official site as their ticket provider, who say are a "new and independent ticketing company dedicated to bringing you cheaper service charges, the best customer experience possible and innovations in ticketing." Well, in terms of customer experience, I think those like myself who bought standing tickets in the pre-sale will be greatly dissatisfied. With only a week or so to go until the gig, a great number of those who bought standing tickets in the pre-sale received an e-mail from Crowdsurge saying they had made an "unfortunate error" and had sent us seating tickets instead. Despite my best efforts, they couldn't do anything about it, and offered to refund the booking fee for the tickets and send signed Foals T-shirts as compensation (which at the time of writing, haven't arrived yet), which is less than satisfactory.
However, this really couldn't dampen what was a fantastic gig. Firstly, one of the support bands were absolutely fantastic and anyone who was there probably really enjoyed their set and would advise you to listen to them. Their name was Crystal Fighters, who had a Gogol Bordello set-up but very much had a samba-dance sound and certainly had some catchy tunes such as Xtatic Truth and Champion Sound, and they even played a dubstep song called Swallow, which I personally quite enjoyed.
As for Foals, the band have the ability to play a set which not only combines songs that will get the crowd jumping, but also have several songs which you can simply bathe in their beauty, Spanish Sahara even combines the two, a song that was simply amazing when played.
They started off the set with recently released single Blue Blood which really got the gig off to a flier which such funky guitar riffs. Songs such as Balloons, Cassius, Red Socks Pugie and Olympic Airways were played off the album Antidotes, while Miami, Total Life Forever and the atmospheric and climatic Spanish Sahara off the latest album, Total Life Forever, creating a brilliant atmosphere within the venue and all were massive crowd favourites.
Highlights included Yannis jumping into the crowd during Electric Bloom and personal favourites What Remains, After Glow and 2 Trees all being played, songs that contain such sheer beauty you had to bask in and just admire.
The gig really climaxed during the encore, coming back on stage to play the French Open and Hummer, a song they hadn't played in a while before their recent tour for the new album. They finished with a bang, and what a bang, with Two Steps, Twice, gradually building and building the tempo before sending their adoring faithful into a wild frenzy, what a way to finish.
Considering my friend & I were in seating and not in the frenetic standing area may have worsened our experience of the gig, but in fact, it's definitely up there in the top 5 gigs I've ever been to, and I was simply lost for words at how they good they were on our journey home. After that, I'll definitely be looking to get a standing ticket for their New Years Eve gig at the HMV Forum, and you should too.
