WORDS AND IMAGES RHYS GROVER
Madness are currently on their ‘C’est le Vie’ tour, and have brought Ian Broudie and The Lighting Seeds along for the ride. Two fantastic bands to see live, and it makes for a great show.
Despite the weather warnings, the Manchester faithful had gathered early for the night. Fez’s were at the ready, positions taken, ready and waiting for the night to kick off. A near full AO Arena always plays great host no matter who is on stage, but when it’s a band that have built such a loyal and fantastic fanbase as Madness have over their lengthy career, it just makes things extra special. They’re one of those bands where everyone knows a handful of songs without even realising.
The Lighting Seeds took to the stage around an hour after the doors, and their around hour long setlist was filled with killer tracks. 10 tracks is a good handful for a support slot, and gives opportunity for the odd back catalogue track, but also the perfect opportunity for some cracking tunes. Their set also included a cover of ‘You Showed Me’, a cover of a track by The Byrds, and they put their own twist on it, Beatles / John Lennon tracks ‘Love Me Do’, ‘Imagine’, and ‘All You Need Is Love’ intertwined into the track too. Obviously, it had to be ‘Three Lions’ to close out their incredible set.
9pm soon came around, and Madness took their positions behind the curtain which was hanging on the stage. A screen above lit up, and a reel of opening film played as the stage curtain swung open and Suggs began to belt out their opening number. I was positioned at the mixing desk for the first three tracks, and between myself and the stage was a sea of fez’s, bouncing away for every single track. ‘Theatre of the Absurd’, a track from their latest album which this tour is in support of, opened the evening to a great response from the crowd. Newer material can always be a risk at a live show as not everyone will be familiar with it, but the Madness faithful didn’t let the band down and got into the spirit of things straight away.
Madness then harked back to their very first single, ‘The Prince’ and the crowd went bezerk. The old tracks are always going to be a bigger hit, and will always be an integral part of a Madness set. After all, the 25 track setlist was majority older material, but a healthy 9 tracks from their latest offering took their place in the set. The initial set was a good mixture of new and old, but the best was saved til last.
They’d broken the set into three parts, a prologue, act one and act two, each distinguished by short films and over the speaker tracks. The latter of which was where the big hits were lying, the likes of ‘One Step Beyond’, ‘ House Of Fun’, ‘Baggy trousers’ and ‘Our House’. The closing stages were nothing but pure singalong hits, the crowd were lapping it up, and somehow the fez’s were still placed on the heads, although a few had been lost along the way.
The last hurrah was the encore, made up of three tracks, ‘Friday Night, Saturday Morning’, ‘Madness’ and ‘Night Boat to Cairo’ sent the incredible Manchester fanbase back into the cold and wet Manchester night. Madness have been a mainstay in the music scene since day one of their careers, their fanbase has always sworn an incredible loyalty to the band and followed them around the world. Suggs is an incredible frontman with fantastic charisma, their on stage style has remained much the same, and their music has never taken a dip.
SET LIST
PROLOGUE “MR BECKETT SIR…”
1 THEATRE OF THE ABSURD
2/ THE PRINCE
3/ THE BEGINNERS 101
4/ MY GIRL
5/ HOUR OF NEED
6/ NW5
ACT ONE SURROUNDED ON ALL SIDES
7 C’EST LA VIE
8/ EMBARRASSMENT
9/ BABY BURGLAR
10/ GREY DAY
11/ RUN FOR YOU LIFE
12/ SHUT UP
ACT TWO THE DAMSEL IN DISTRESS
13/ ROUND WE GO
14/ BED AND BREAKFAST MAN
15/ THE LAW ACCORDING TO DR KIPPAH
16/ WINGS OF A DOVE
17/ IN MY STREET
18/ ONE STEP BEYOND
19/ HOUSE OF FUN
20/ BAGGY TROUSERS
21/ OUR HOUSE
22/ IT MUST BE LOVE
ENCORE
23/ FRIDAY NIGHT, SATURDAY MORNING
24/ MADNESS
25/ NIGHT BOAT TO CAIRO
FOLLOW MADNESS
FOLLOW THE LIGHTNING SEEDS
My life is a soundtrack, i track my life through music, photography is my passion, my escape, my expression. Without both i have pieces missing, thankfully i’m blessed and get to combine both.
Born in Manchester, lived in Australia for 22 years where i was heavily involved in the Australian Music Industry, firstly in bands (Singer) and then managing bands (all original), I moved back to the UK, Wales specifically 10 years ago
