Bloc Party – 27th November 2015 (Paradiso – Amsterdam)

British Bloc Party returned to Amsterdam because of the tour to promote their new album HYMNS, which will be released in late January 2016. Their first stop on the European tour was the legendary venue Paradiso and had eclectic Steve as opening act, a real orchestra woman with the sole help of a guitar, a set of pedals and synthesizers, and that for about 30 minutes offered a show full of effects and feedbacks that reached its peak with “Emergency Art Rate“, but that shortly connected with an audience that eagerly awaited the main band.

Before a sold out hall, Londoners led by Kele Okereke came on stage under the strains of their new song “Eden“, which shows an attempt to approach closer to dark electronic sounds. Before the mild reaction of the public, surprised the first notes of “I’ve Been Tired” by Pixies, who later would become the animated “Octopus“, that was more danced by the public, to be followed by the general madness of the  famous “Hunting for Witches“. Now that everything was favourable, it would be time for a decaffeinated “Positive Tension“, in which the new drummer Louise Bartle did not reach the strength and pace of its predecessor Matt Tong, a feature that would be noticeable throughout the whole show.

The new themes “Virtue” and “The Good News” once again cooled the atmosphere, although the second shown some blues touches that surely will get that the songs became one of the preferred by the fans of the band in the coming months. Luckily the concatenation of two of their greatest hits like “Song for Clay (Disappear Here)” and “Banquet” made that the audience once again sang and danced as if there were no tomorrow, creating a positive atmosphere for the rest of the concert. Probably this general benevolence helped and made that the hodgepodge of expendable songs such as the new “Exes“, or the desperate attempt to sound like in the past which is “So He Begins to Lie“, along with some of their best known tracks as “Ratchet” or a weak interpretation of “Flux“, were chanted in unison by a loyal and devoted audience, unable to be critical with approximately 20 final minutes that analysed from our point of view almost unnoticed.

There would still be time for some encores that started with unnecessary personal recognition of Kele on the deadbeat “So Real“, in which he played a keyboard situated in the center of the stage only for that song, and whose sound was almost negligible in the overall of the song. On the other hand, the criticised “The Love Within“, first single from their new album, sounded with much more strength and pace of what is perceived in physical format, and  we advance that in the future it will became capital on the more danceable moments of their shows. To close the concert with a safe bet, the British would opt for “Helicopter” and “This Modern Love“, showing that any past was better and that despite some remarkable tracks, the hard core of its live show is still focus on their first two Albums released in mid last decade.. So, bare pass concert for a band that must offer something better, in which probably the next months will be capital to combine better on live shows some of their new members, especially the drummer Louise Bartle, and that also will bright better on express concerts at the festival season, with a setlist focused only on the hits of their long discography that will be benefit them..