Ellie Goulding @ The Garage, 10th February 2010

Ellie Goulding has been much heralded as the sound of 2010, winning the BBC Poll of the same name and being high up on any list of the Next Big Things.It was therefore only fitting that she should be headlining one of the nights at the HMV Next Big Thing festival, which took place over 6 London venues and a week's worth of gigs in February, the premise being that you get to see 3 'hot new acts' and all for the princely sum of £10. With no booking fee. NO BOOKING FEE. A-M-A-Z-I-N-G!

Anyway, the first act was a guy I hadn't heard of called Tinashe, who played the acoustic guitar and was accompanied by a great drummer who, now I come to think about it, looked quite like Animal off of The Muppets (he also had a sort of 'fallen Erik Hassle' hair cut, but more of that later). Tinashe interacted really well with the audience and between the 2 of them they created a pretty cool sound. The music was fun and upbeat, and really made me want to hear more. Check out his myspace or catch him on tour with the Noisettes later this year.

Next on was Erik Hassle (he of the hair and the electro-pop sounds). He has some good songs - his current single 'Hurtful' being my favourite - but he didn't make a huge impact on the night. He was given a warm reception but not an excited one. In an age of female pop princesses I sense that he's struggling to find his niche. I shall see him again at the end of the month when he's supporting Mika, so we'll see how well he comes across there.

Finally the main act of the evening, Ellie Goulding, came onto the stage. She had that slight confused air of someone who isn't used to the limelight, saying that she hadn't expected so many people to be there. Given the amount of hype behind her she's better get used to it.

And what of the hype? Well, she can certainly sing - her voice is sweet and she trills like a little bird. Her folk / electro sound comes together best on new single 'Starry Eyed', which she closed the night with. Previous single 'Under The Sheets' also resonated but the rest of her stuff sort of washed pleasantly over me without making too much of an impression, including a cover of a track by American band Midlake (there's been quite a lot of fuss about them recently, I must check them out). It was all very nice, but not hugely memorable. Maybe hers is the kind of music that needs a couple of listens before it lodges itself in your brain. Who knows.

Well, on the basis of that performance I'm definitely going to get a copy of the album when it comes out, but I probably won't be going to see her play live again until her music has got the better of me...

Starry Eyed is out on February 22nd

MIKA @ The Roundhouse, 31st July 2009

Kerching-ah!

I must admit that I went to the final night of the iTunes festival with relatively low expectations. I couldn’t find anyone who wanted to come and see the man himself with me, so I went on my own and, as is so often the case, met some really nice people on the way.

Being an iTunes Festival veteran by now I turned up at exactly the right time to see the full set of support act Erik Hassle. Unfortunately, my smugness was ruined by the face that they had arsed around with the timings as the beginning of Mika’s set was being broadcast live on ITV2 and I arrived half way through. From what I saw, Erik Hassle was pretty good AND has preposterous hair (think ginger Mr Whippy or male La Roux), which seems to be de rigueur at the moment.



Up front I will tell you that Mika’s set was awesome. The main reasons for this are as follows:

1. They covered the whole stage in silver glitter, the only act I saw at The Roundhouse who personalised the stage. There was also a glitter cannon (awesome) which means I was picking silver confetti out of my bag / clothes / shoes for days afterwards
   
   
   
2. There was a whole choir with slightly mental silver sparkly cardboard hats
   
3. MIKA looked like something out a Clockwork Orange if they had been dressed in white dungarees and had top hats. Well, the eye make up was similar anyway
   
4. He played all the old brilliant songs and also some new ones, which is always a good mix
   
5. MIKA can really sing. And play the piano. And jump about like a lunatic. And throw buckets full of glitter over the crowd in true clown style
   
6. They did an encore
   
7. The encore included the introduction of dozens of huge balloons into the crowd for us to play with
   

See I told you. UNDENIABLY AWESOME.


Ultimately it was actually one of the most fun gigs I’ve been to in a long time. MIKA has boundless energy and all the songs really came alive in the live environment. I definitely will be going to see him on his next tour.

MIKA’s new single “We are Golden” is out on September 7th