Wolf Alice
3Arena, Dublin
★★★★☆
Storm Bram has done its best to keep Wolf Alice from the door. The chart-topping English indie band are due to round off their largest-ever tour with a 3Arena concert where they’ll be supported by their kindred alternative rockers Bria and Sunflower Bean.
But this ultimately superb – if underattended – Dublin show is nearly derailed by the elements. Cancelled ferry crossings mean the opening acts can’t make it, while Wolf Alice’s tour trucks arrive late. That means their crew have “had to do 12 hours of work in about three hours”, Ellie Rowsell informs the audience, the big screen capturing the worry on the singer’s face. It genuinely seems to have gone down to the wire.
The stress and trauma of crossing the Irish Sea amid a soggy pre-Christmas typhoon turn out to be worth it. Taking to the stage nearly half an hour later than billed, Wolf Alice put on a dazzling performance that showcases the charismatic Rowsell’s skills as a frontwoman and the band’s talent for old-school indie pop.
Or at least it does eventually. The initial stumbling block is that the tour is in support of the group’s thoroughly average new album, The Clearing. A self-conscious attempt at appealing to a wider audience, the record has its moments, but it is ultimately undone by the annoying production of Greg Kurstin, the hitmaker who has also worked with Adele, Kylie Minogue and Harry Styles, among others.
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Kurstin has a particular set of skills, which is to make every song he touches sound like a variation of The Girl from Ipanema. That schmaltzy signature is slathered all over new Wolf Alice tunes such as The Clearing’s opening tracks, Thorns and Bloom Baby Bloom (which makes a decent go of sounding like an indie Kate Bush before going worryingly lounge jazz in the middle).
That Wolf Alice have an eye on the big time is evident from their staging. Having come up through the UK indie circuit, they’ve tried to adjust to arena performance with a production that splits the difference between an Abba tribute night and a low-budget Olivia Rodrigo show.
A huge, sparkly sheet is arranged at their backs, while Rowsell has her own revolving platform that spins ... very, very slowly. There is also a wind machine near the front, allowing her to do her best impression of a big-haired 1980s pop star. These contrivances don’t quite work – an indie band is still an indie band – but there’s charm in seeing the group trying to adjust to the demands of suddenly being a lot bigger and not entirely pulling it off.
Things step up a gear as they delve back into their catalogue. Formidable Cool, from their Mercury-winning second album, Visions for a Life, is a shrieking rock-out, while How Can I Make It OK?, from their album Blue Weekend, is a gorgeous onslaught of orchestral pop spotlighting the expressive backing vocals of Joff Oddie, their guitarist.
One distraction is that 3Arena is not entirely full. Wolf Alice’s UK tour was a sell-out – there wasn’t a seat to be had when they rocked the 20,000-capacity O2 in London on consecutive nights at the start of the month – but that’s not the case here. Following on from a likewise underattended 3Arena show by The Last Dinner Party in November, it’s the second time in as many months that a band have headlined this soulless barn when a more modest venue would have suited better. Dublin is clearly crying out for a 5,000- to 8,000-capacity space: why won’t anyone build one?
Rowsell’s paternal grandparents are from Dublin, and she manages a decent “go raibh maith agat” towards the end. She also revives the lost art of singers yelling into a loud hailer on the blistering Yuk Foo and straps on a theatrical Flying V guitar for Giant Peach before they close the encore with the sublime goth-pop of Don’t Delete the Kisses.
Given the weather and the turnout, this show could easily have been a write-off. But Wolf Alice have turned disaster into triumph, and by the time they’re played off with Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody they’ve delivered a few thunderbolts of their own during a scintillating gig.
