Bombay Bicycle Club: Bristol o2, 12/10/11

Equipped with an oversized tandem, they pedalled onto the ‘underage’ music scene back in 2005, surprisingly not even school leavers. Outside of GCSE Music lessons, winning V Festival’s Road To V gave them a headstart in the race. Here,‘V’ wasn’t losing their virginity, but the pursuit of success.

 Beginning as an innocent amateur cycling day trip, from the indie-pop first album I Had The Blues But I Shook Them Loose to a more electro feel in the most recent, A Different Kind Of Fix, you do wonder if they meant to stumble and Shuffle onto the stage; was their discovery of their roots coincidentally accidental? 

   Typically indie, The Club have a sort of unique flavour. Their bouncy tunes, despite being chilled and summery, work paradoxically and create eruptions of heavy mosh-pits at gigs. There you’re likely to find annoying indie-sorts, producing photos of themselves in the crowd, maybe the occasional attempt at a crowd-surf in an attempt to show off their chinos and Vans (oh so ironically mainstream). Nevertheless, an indie gig just wouldn’t be the same without. The urgent choruses of Always Like This, Evening Morning and Dust On The Ground have the whole crowd going. Hands flying, heads bouncing, feet everywhere. Pulsating lights synchronised to the percussion, vigorous ‘bombastic’ strumming of increasing intensity, fringe-flicks from the boys. The crowd roars. Always Like This, a personal favourite, always goes down a treat.
   Sweat pouring from his forehead, with a geeky bowl-cut greasy and long and the top button of his shirt awkwardly done up, frontman Jack Steadman clearly isn’t the average ‘cool’ musician. Yet it must be his distinguishably different charismatic Kermit-the Frog-like-voice which pulls the indie chicks in. Steadman grins to yelps of ''Jack. you're my soulmate''. Evidently, it isn't always manufactured predictability and familiarity which is attractive.

   Dusting off the debut album, I Had The Blues…, Steadman recalls a shy love in What If? (‘If only one of us had the guts tonight’), maturing into an absorbed infatuation in Lamplight (‘these scattered flashes of delight, they can't help but sway your mind’). The Hill is an energetic nostalgia of a lost youth of summer weekends lounging on Hampstead Heath, perfectly capturing the very clichéd essence of adolescence. We are soon submerged into summer, forgetting the drissle of the Brissle gig venue.
   The band’s BFFL, a parallel to the acoustic goddess Laura Marling, joins them on stage. Lucy Rose’s beautiful sandy voice really does compliment BBC. We are reminded of the raw talent of the band, their minimalistic nature; the epitome of the acoustic genre. Forget spoilt pop bands with their flaunty outfits and manufactured images. Bombay Bicycle Club effortlessly bring authenticity to the music industry.

   Both band and audience thoroughly enjoy themselves, explaining Bombay’s recent string of sold-out gigs. Emerging from a mist of smoke and strobe lights, Steadman promises ‘meets and greets’ by the merch stand, gifting the crowd with even more than their £18 bargained for.

   Their stabilisers now abandoned, we do find ourselves wondering what the boys will fix us up with next- will they go hip-hop for their fourth album? Unconvinced? Then you need to hear their cover of Derulo’s Whatcha Say...