MICHAEL KIWANUKA | LIVE REVIEW
Tramshed, Cardiff, Mon 17 Oct
As a fortysomething, it’s rare for me to be bringing down the average age of an audience, but tonight my luck is in. Many of my fellow gig goers are old enough to have dated or been weaned on Bill Withers, who was a big influence on Kiwanuka’s first album, but since that more acoustic debut, and his appearance at Green Man’s Walled Garden in 2012, MK has expanded his sound and his band, and even carries enough status these days to have his own font, judging by the big shadowed MICHAEL KIWANUKA lettering behind him on stage, which is perhaps evidence that he’s still seeking affirmation of who he is.
After support act Isaac Gracie does his pleasant enough Ralph McTell-meets-J Tillman acoustic tunes, MK strides on stage and plugs in during the keyboard washes of Cold Little Heart, noodling at the guitar to evoke some Pink Floyd’s drearier tunes. It suffers from the absence of female backing singers and strings and things that Danger Mouse ladled onto the album, though they’re not missed for the rest of the 12-song set.
One More Night is the first of his catchy pop songs, with the Hammond sound giving it a little funky swing. I’ll Get Along, from first album Home Again, doo-wops along in a Cadillac like The Impressions and I’m Getting Ready is a comforting acoustic shuffle. Prince is revealed as an influence in Sometimes It Snows In April, his first encore, and a respectful if unremarkable cover, with his deep voice perhaps being a little too low in key, though the crowd is hushed for the duration.
There’s also a Prince-like solo from MK in the Otis-style tearjerker of The Final Frame, destined to be a divorcee’s soundtrack for some of those in the audience. Falling is another slow waltz number, and a little lacklustre in its simple melodrama, but to balance out the few lower points of his set, MK and his band are expansive on three corkers.
Tell Me A Tale spins the sweet Curtis Mayfield soul of the “Lord I need loving…” chorus into an extended afrobeat jam: the drummer giving it some Tony Allen welly, rat-tatting away to a false crescendo, before MK orchestrates a sublime Terry Callier jazz breakdown, to a cyclical acoustic riff. Black Man In A White World is another standout, with us honkies politely joining in with the Nina Simone See Line Woman handclaps (noting MK’s preference for conciliatory handclaps over a clenched black power fist, possibly acknowledging the lack of diversity in his fanbase), before the drums and congas kick in on top of the squiggly bassline, and the controlled wah-wah riff of Sideshow Bob Marley, who my lady says is excellent all night, peering through his chunky dreads.
Father’s Child, which MK – who doesn’t seem to have time for much banter – tells us is one of his faves from Love & Hate, is a rich soulful stew with MK owning Dangermouse’s lyrics of “You’ve got yours, I’m gonna get what’s mine” over a warm Rhodes keyboard and skipping beat. Single Love & Hate is saved for his final tune, though the lines “You can’t break me down, you can’t take me down” sound resigned in his plaintive voice, rather than defiant. Like a musical magpie, Michael Kiwanuka recycles from various sources, but, like the second-hand retailer, he does deliver a little bit of everything that someone likes.
words CHRIS SEAL