Heading to a matinee show is a pretty great way to spend a lazy Sunday, especially if the gig in question features the gorgeous indie-electro twosome Porcelain Pill.
The show was to support the launch of their first self-titled EP featuring the single ‘Aviary’, and those attending received a free copy upon arrival.
Gypsy-infused male/female duo The Imprints kicked off the afternoon with some very distinctive and unusual use of drums and violin looping. Their cover of The Presets ‘Steamworks’ was stunning and atmospheric.
The four lads from The Sleepy Dreamers followed, with their folky, Bon Iver-esque harmonised tunes.
To set the scene for Porcelain Pill, two giant gold birdcages were placed at each side of the stage. At first glance it looked as if they housed red hearts, but inside there were actually dolls wearing red dresses. Spooky.
Adam Scott-McGuiness: lead vocals, guitar, ukulele, and looping was dressed in a dapper suit and waistcoat, and Madeleine Becker: backing vocals, cello, keyboards, and sequencing channeled her inner Stevie Nicks in a floaty throw. The pair looked wonderful.
The band’s sound is both twee and melancholy. Scott-McGuinness has the Patrick Wolf thing going on: fierce one moment and then laconic and poetic the next. Becker is elegant as she moves between standing at her keyboard and then sitting on a chair closer to the stage to play the cello.
These fluid movements between instruments made the set more interesting than the usual set up. And, at one point, Scott-McGuinness played the ukulele with his mouth.
‘Sunday is a day of rest. But the rest of the week is long,’ are the opening lines to the lead single. Fittingly, when the group played this tune, which begins with birds twittering in the background, the crowd realised they had to make the most of their remaining weekend and get themselves up from the couches and chairs and join the front of the stage for some dancing and cheering.
The duo are humorous and personable on stage, making fun of themselves when they had to restart a song – simply because they’d forgotten to plug in a looping pedal.
‘Anomaly’ was another highlight that got under the audience’s skin with its bleeping heartbeat loops, romantic sentiment and beautiful vocal delivery: ‘With your hand in mine and my hand in yours, is there something you want to say?”
Porcelain pill were the perfect pop antidote to stave the achingly bittersweet feeling that sets in on a Sunday afternoon, when the weekend is almost over and it’s back to the grind.
