Ten years ago, a more cynical reviewer might have said Billy Idol was like a parody of a 1980s rock icon: bleached white hair, leather jacket and snarling live vocals. ‘Billy Idol’ even sounds like the name of the fake rockstar in some ‘80s coming-of-age film about the dangers of rock‘n’roll. But tonight live in Cardiff at the International Arena, in this brand new era of flashy swagger and lovable egos, I totally got it. He loves himself, and we all loved it too.
Billy Idol emerges onto a platform, shirtless but for a leather jacket; the women scream. This is probably how it has been for 40 years; and now, again, the band launched into Dancing With Myself to wild cries. The frontman has always had some serious pipes, and they’re all still there. That croak he uses for speaking rises into an immense growl that is one of the best examples of live vocals I’ve seen to date.
Founding axeman and songwriting partner Steve Stevens refuses to be sidelined, making sure that wherever the show goes, it always comes back to a full course of virtuoso shredding. That’s what it is: a show. Everyone is smiling; the band are having a great time. It’s cheese, but that’s what makes it great.
What a contrast, then, with main support Killing Joke, who seem to be just running through the motions. I should be clear: Killing Joke is absolutely one of the most important bands to have ever existed, which is why I love them too much to let this go. A band that provided some of the most hair-raising, pulse-quickening postpunk rhythms I’ve ever heard, a band that changed the face of music: in the CIA they hid all that away, completely inaudibly, under walls and walls of distorted guitar.
The band sometimes lost time, and it often wasn’t even clear what song was being played. Jaz Coleman still fronts with as much intensity as ever, but even his powerful vocals were swept away in the absolute avalanche of distorted noise and delay effects. The crowd was unimpressed, I was devastated, and at the end of the set the band wordlessly left the stage.
Billy Idol + Killing Joke, Cardiff International Arena, Mon 17 Oct
words JASON MACHLAB photos TIM ALBAN
