LIVE : Placebo
When you think of a Placebo gig, common images which are conjured up are 13 year old wannabe-goths wearing far too much eyeliner, the sexually ambiguous Brian Molko wearing far too much eyeliner, and probably Placebo-branded makeup for sale at the entrance.
They’ve been around for a decade, have fi ve studio albums and a Greatest Hits under their belt, and Brian even has a six month old kid now So a new studio album brings new promise; instead of a Greatest Hits tour we get to hear new stuff from Meds, plus the possibility of performing old songs. It seemed as if they wanted to get the new stuff out of the way quickly, performing Infra-Red, Drag, recent single Because I Want You and Space Monkey fi rst off.
It was a good start, building up anticipation with lots of Swedish pouting from Stefan and some great drumming from Steve. They exploded with the superb Come Home, and interspersed between practically every other new song from the album were great performances of my favourite, and Cruel Intentions classic Every You Every Me, Special Needs, a gorgeous slow version of 36 Degrees, The Bitter End and Twenty Years.
From what they performed it’s obvious that they’re only briefl y looking back through their back catalogue and focusing on the future with Meds, which is their darkest album, no mean feat given the copmetition. Another couple of surprises were due in the encore with a fantastically worked-out cover of Kate Bush’s Running Up That Hill.
VV from The Kills joined Brian on stage for a performance of Meds which was received rapturously by the crowd, before the band turned the clock right back to the start with performances of Teenage Angst and the awesome timeless Nancy Boy to end the show. While it was a professional show, it wasn’t an exciting one - Placebo know what to do, and nowadays they just do it.
20th Apr 2006