By Charlotte Baxter
"This is no rules night," proclaimed Danny Goffey, Supergrass's exhuberant drummer, at the band's "silent" gig at the Concorde 2 in Brighton on Thursday. It was a little overstated - we were only listening to the music through headphones - but the band was up for it and let rip with a riotous, drunken set, in between chatting away to the audience about how strange it all was.
The warm-up, from the Dutch DJ OD, hadn't been terribly warming, but it wasn't entirely his fault. Arrivals to the venue on Brighton's seafront were greeted with a distinct lack of atmosphere — people stood around on the silent dance floor with their bulky headphones awkwardly clamped on the back of their head, around their neck or half-and-half with one ear on the music and the other on their friends, while OD assured his podcast listeners that these Brightonians were crazy people.
A rather odd combination of accessories flowing from a "dressing-up box" in the corner helped, as did the Moscow Mule cocktails handed out on entry. The audience mixed and matched from feather boas, fishnet gloves, and fake moustaches that made them look like camped-up versions of the men in the 118 118 ads.
Once the band took centre stage, the headphones went on. You never forgot you had them on your head, but you gradually got past the feeling that you'd come to a gig with your Walkman on. There were two realities, and it was easy to step between them. Put the headphones on and you were at a raucous gig. Take them off and you could have a quiet chat with your neighbour while listening to Supergrass exposed, hearing only the bap bap of the electric drum kit, sometimes the "bock" of a cowbell and the sound of two blokes singing rather well.
Article comments
1 - Monkeyharris
I think that this review is being quite kind. In reality I found that the atmosphere was completely flat with only a few people silently nodding to the beat. Supergrass are a great band - we know that they're tight - I dont' need headphones to prove that to me. We also know that they can get a crowd going...but you need to know that no one can hear you OVER the band when you're shouting along, out of tune. I think that Silent Disco is a bit of a gimmick and unfortunatley one of our best bands was made to sound ordinary for the sake of cool..