Music review: Feeding off each other: Bastille kicks off a year of live shows

The British band Bastille was about to wrap up their Asian tour, and their appearance here in Manila was the penultimate stop before Hong Kong, where they are as of publication time. What interested me at first while waiting in line for their concert at the World Trade Center in Pasay on January 5 show was the kind of crowd this band drew: mostly young people in their mid-teens to early twenties and a few families. It was that sort of youthful energy that would be most receptive to the band’s often danceable tunes.

Once inside the venue after a long wait, much of the crowd packed a small space nearer to the stage, probably filling up a quarter of the cavernous hall’s space.

The band arrived on stage to the tune of the theme from Twin Peaks, a reference which I suspect only a few of us could catch. From the outset, Bastille got their fans excited with songs such as “Bad Blood” and “Things We Lost in the Fire.”

There was the inevitable use of cellphones to record key moments (or probably all of the moments) of the show, far more than what I noticed last time I watched a visiting act.

There was also an overwhelming sense of delight at what the band played, and except for a few technical hitches, the show went well. The ensemble managed to save the day by, among other things, performing a drum solo and doing a song in another arrangement, while their crew went about discreetly fixing things.

My favorite moments happened roughly during the last third, when the band played the moving song “Oblivion.” It was dusty in the room when they performed it, I noticed. The other big moment was when they did “The Draw,” and lead singer Dan Smith put on a hoodie and ran to one side of the venue and back, the crowd chasing him as he went about singing.

And there was also an overwhelming sense of joy when, after eighteen songs, they ended their encore set with the hit “Pompeii.” And just like that, the show was over, and we all walked away.

I am certain that there will be more excited reactions to this show than mine. I definitely enjoyed this production, and I admired how the band and the crowd really felt excited being around each other.

The best I can say, though, is that after all this time touring, Bastille are a really tight ensemble, musically. Like some of the acts I’ve watched over the years from both here and abroad, they remind me the most of the thrill of making music very well. It is the sort of well-made music that would delight people and draw from them that feeling of joie de vivre that we sometimes need. — BM, GMA News