161. The Naked and Famous
The Forum
14 February 2017
Valentine’s Day. A time for lovers, poets, and heavily reverbed Kiwi synth-pop outfits with anthemic tendencies. However, for me and my best mate and comrade in all things sonic, this February 14th meant only one thing: our sacred, biannual “Day Off.” A full-throttle, vinyl-sifting, wine-glugging, boutique-soundtracked holiday from adult responsibility.
The day began in Shoreditch, land of beards, overpriced coffee, and record stores with sections like “Scandinavian Dream-Gaze (Early Period)”. We spent the afternoon crate-digging with the intensity of two men searching for long-lost treasure.
Then to Hoi Polloi for dinner, a restaurant so achingly hip it felt like eating dinner inside a font catalogue. But the wine flowed, the food sang, and we were still jabbering on about our usual nonsense when we arrived in Kentish Town for pre-gig cocktails… in a Victorian public lavatory. A speakeasy cocktail bar, accessed via a spiral staircase that once hosted the tragic ballet of Edwardian bladder control. Now it served negronis to the aggressively ironic.
Tonight, we are seeing The Naked and Famous, New Zealand’s finest purveyors of emotionally charged synth-pop with skyscraper choruses, angular lighting, and the sort of songs that make you want to break up with someone just so you can text them the lyrics.
They launched into the set with “Higher”. Alisa Xayalith, front and centre, all shimmering vocals and high-drama cheekbones, commanded the crowd like a disco Valkyrie. The songs thundered past: “Punching in a Dream,” “Girls Like You,” “Hearts Like Ours”, every one of them an arena-sized anthem disguised as a breakup letter.
The band don’t do much in the way of chat, they let the synths do the talking, music that pulses in fluorescent bursts, drenched in echo, like a strobe-lit heartbeat. It’s pop music with a PhD in melodrama and a minor in My Bloody Valentine.
The crowd is an eclectic mix of Gen Z glitter kids, millennial indie survivors, and us. By the time they closed with “Young Blood”, that glorious shout-along of synth-pop euphoria, arms were in the air, and the crowd was bouncing. We weren’t, not because the music didn’t move us, it was a good gig. However, this was the end of a long, but fun day, and frankly we were ready for bed.