Ladyhawke at KOKO: live review | My Chemical Toilet

Can You Gig It?: Ladyhawke @ KOKO, London, 21.5.09

It seems you kids with your leopard print shoes, your checked shirts and your love for all things ‘80s are pretty fond of the little blonde kiwi with the big ideas (excuse me while I copyright that idea for a children’s book), and were out in force for the Ladyhawke musical extravaganza at KOKO last week.

The current darling of the Radio One brigade, Ladyhawke’s accessible brand of nostalgic musical references has won hearts all across the land. And as with any flavour of the month, she’s a tough act to open for - luckily, young Tommy Sparks was up to the job.

Bounding onto the stage in full Pikachu costume, he sprinkled the crowd with his glittery electro-pop and set the scene nicely for the main act.

Oddly, however, his most infectiously energetic number, current single “She’s Got Me Dancing “, was shoved unceremoniously into the middle of the set, leaving a couple of rather muddier tunes to close on.

Now, I love Ladyhawke. So I really, really want to give her a glowing review, to say it was the perfect set, the perfect performance, the perfect blend of songs. But the problem is that, apart from a few stand-out songs, Ladyhawke’s slurry, synth-filled sound tends to drift into background music.

Don’t get me wrong, the music itself is great - but as such an unassuming frontwoman, she didn’t manage to hold the audience’s attention for the length of the set.

Much of the crowd seemed to lose interest towards the end, leaving me with the overwhelming feeling that Ladyhawke and the eleven other musicians onstage would have made a great band for a teen movie prom scene. You know, the kind where there’s a live band playing away in the background who nobody really remarks upon until the narrative calls for it.

That’s not to say there weren’t loads of brilliant things about the show; from the CD-quality music to the endearingly awkward between-song chats, she would have comfortably won the crowd over if it wasn’t already full of converts.

Giving Britney Spears’ “Womanizer” an acceptably breathy stab and pleasing us with favourites like “Paris is Burning”, all in all it was a jolly nice show, complete with twinkly fairy lights and party poppers.

“This is ‘Professional Suicide’,” she told us at one point, peering out from beneath that chunky blonde fringe. Far from it, Ms. Hawke – perhaps just in need of a bit more character, a little more killer and a touch less filler.

[image: AFlickion on Flickr]