Recensie Kaiser Chiefs

The Future is Medieval is the newest of Kaiser Chiefs, that brought  the Leeds band to Latvia for the first time ever, Wednesday night, to perform before the narrow, few hundred audience at the Palladium concert hall. That gave us almost an exclusive feel and what a night! The British finely dressed quintet was welcomed with a general uproar from the public as “Everyday I Love You Less and Less” broke out.

Although, the band does not stand out with rocket science-like, complex songs, it was impossible to stand still in this concert. Kaiser Chiefs brand of pop rarely goes out of style, so that night, they owned the audience with na-na-na type of choruses and catchy lyrics, easy to sing along. At the same time, Ricky Wilson, the front-man, ran the stage with perfect showmanship for an hour and a half and 16 songs, not missing a beat. By the fifteenth minute in the show, he stepped down the stage, up to the rod, held back by the covering party, he stood closer than ever to the public.

Kaiser Chiefs other four faithful musicians did their job pretty well too, showing a much rawer and rockier side of an almost indie- pop band. „Little Shock”, a song from the new album The Future is Medieval released in June 2011, was definitely the ice-breaker , that got the somewhat shy public to open up and put their hands up in the air. The drums and sparkling, almost blinding stage-lights ignited the atmosphere in the small concert theater, not that Kaiser Chief‘s concerts have ever been quiet, though.

The most lyrical song of the night turned out to be „Starts With Nothing” and probably was the only one that succeeded in calming down the youngsters. The audience almost fell for it, before “I Predict a Riot” came up next and literary produced a riot-like reaction, as for most of the other hit songs, coming from the very successful debut album Employment issued in 2005.

The most popular singles heard Wednesday night were“Oh My God”, “I Predict a Riot”, “Everyday I Love You Less and Less”, “Modern way”. “Ruby” also produced an equally loud sing-along and bouncing in rhythm. Finally, closing out with the party- rocker “Oh My God”, the Brits left fans asking for more and hoping that this wasn‘t the last time they would see the Kaiser Chiefs in Riga.

The band itself comes originally from Leeds, Britain and was formed in 1997 with the name of Parva, which changed to Kaiser Chiefs in 2003. The name actually comes from the South-African football club, called Kaiser Chiefs, where Lucas Radebe, the former Leeds captain played. Needless to say, the musicians took the name in honour of this. They‘ve received 3 Brit Awards in 2006 for the best band, best rock band and best concert categories. All together, there are five of them: Ricky Wilson as lead singer, Andrew ‘Whitey‘ White as guitarist, Simon Rix as basist, Nick ‘Peanut‘ Baines as keyboardist and Nick Hodgson as singer and drum player. Kaiser Chiefs gained success in 2005 with Employment (tunes  like “I Predict a Riot”, “Oh My God”, “Everyday I Love You Less and Less”). Their second ‘child‘ was Yours Truly, Angry Mob, that came out in 2007, sold 1.3 m and gave them a No 1 single in England with “Ruby“.  Off With Their Heads, the band‘s third album, sold only 310,000 copies in Britain and needless to say, didn‘t do as good. However,  with The Future is Medieval, is somewhat a fresh breath for the band with 20 new tracks and the possibility for the fans to select their own tracklists.

< Marta Lenkevica >