Caravan Palace live @ o2 Birmingham
It has been only a few months since knowing the name Caravan Palace, shown to me by a friend.
So lets just get this out of the way, I will give anything a go although I have musical preferences. Yet CP is without a doubt one of my most exciting artist discovery's of the past 12 months.
As such was excited to hear I would be covering their Birmingham Gig, one of three uk dates on the tour on behalf of Counteract magazine.
The gig was pushed forward so that the club night Propaganda could start on time and was able to find a front row seat on the balcony to see the show.
The support act The Geek x Vrv came on first. The French duo played a mash up of hip hop beats and snippets from well known songs as well as using chaos pads to overlay a hip hop beat over the mix. At this point the crowd was slowly building and had a good number of them bopping along.
What caught my attention was the diversity of age of the people attending this gig. Some very young and some a lot older however everyone was prepared to give the music a chance, this also mirrored the fusion of old and new music.
For the amount of instruments the change over was fast and the band came on at full energy. All suited in their mono outfits their second song was their well known track Lone Diver which gathered the entire crowed into the right mood.
Here in the UK all too often we need to be encouraged to participate in a gig by dancing and cheering yet throughout this entire event you could feel the energy of the crowd just waiting for an excuse to show the band their support. The band gave 100 percent and the crowed gave 120%.
If I had to use one word to describe CP it would be Fusion as it fuses so many different styles of music that you would not normally hear together so well. From the funky vibes to the more deep and strong dubstep underpinnings. And again most of all with the more electro sounds it did not go over so well with the older crowed yet the pace did not once slow down.
It was obvious that this was a well rehearsed gig, as soon as one of the seven band members stepped away from the front of the stage there was another quick to run to the front and draw more excited cheers from the crowd. The attention to detail throughout the show till the very end was outstanding with the CP logo animated on one of the last songs Brotherswing behind the band on their own lighting rig that they brought along to the show.
Without a doubt every band member was deeply talented at their own craft but what was more impressive was how they all worked so seamlessly together to make such a entertaining event. I have seen the likes of Major Lazer in this same venue which was also just as entertaining, yet more held together on the back of dancers on stage and co2 canons ect. Yet on the back of the band members alone this event shone bright with practically the entire audience giving a standing ovation that went on so long the band members almost looked aquward at what to do.
10 / 10 great show ans would suggest anyone reading this give them a look into and if given the chance to catch them live that the sooner the better as very soon I have no doubt they will be hitting the world wide stadium scene.
For the full set of images check out the Flickr on this link or lick on the image above :)
Photos and words by Edward Taylor of Digital-Flow