Junior Boys live

Seeing band live is always an exciting and unique experience. Thus, it was with some relish that I drove to Manchester University a couple of days ago to see Canadian electro gods Junior Boys. The intimate 'club academy' provided the perfect venue for the sonic beauty that is the music of the Junior Boys.

Tracks such as 'Hazel', 'Work', "Counting Souvenirs', 'Birthday' and 'In the Morning' created an almost club like atmosphere with deep basslines and electro riffs. Whilst the arrangements varied little from their album counterparts there was more than enough energy in the performance to generate the atmosphere required to get the crowd dancing.

The only down sides to the show were that Jeremy was obviously ill and in his own words, only "95% certain he was playing a show". This may have contributed to the fact that his vocals were almost indistinguishable in the mix. Why they choose (like so many electronic bands) to include a drummer and a guitar in their live set up is quite a mystery. On more than one occasion I was ready to shout: "Oi! Greenspan put the guitar down". Yet as he later admitted, we could shout whatever we wanted and he couldn't understand us (presumably due to our English accents).

Junior Boys come highly recommended. My favourite album is 'So this is goodbye' which along with Soulwax's 'Nite Versions' is a modern classic of electronic music.