Ripping up the status quo and disquieting the audience with a series of carefully constructed epic rock tunes is pretty much what tonight’s all about and it’s difficult not to be aware, in the midst of this, that this is Jared ‘Hollywood actor’ Leto’s band. The phrasing and the precision with which their set is executed gives you the impression of being rehearsed into oblivion and with that there’s inevitably a questioning of how genuine the bands purported ‘love’ for the crowd can be. Aren’t they simply acting at being rockstars? Singing from a script worthy of any movie?
But there’s a point during tonight’s gig where the bombast and the art of ‘show’ is not the first thing that hit’s you. When the opening bars of ‘From Yesterday’ chime out it’s a surprisingly affecting experience. Suddenly I am Jared Leto. Rock Star. Keeping up a frenetic pace throughout as they give us the majority of their two albums to date. As cheesy and naïve as it possibly sounds coming from a thirty five year old who should know better the rest of the set take on a different context. The stronger songs still shine live as on album, ‘A Beautiful Lie’ and ‘The Kill’ in particular mix melody and brutal energy wonderfully.
It’s just a bloody great performance where instead of focusing on my own cynical idea of their artifice there’s an open acknowledgement that at their heart the band, all four members, are fucking great entertainers.
www.30secondstomars.com
www.mekongdelta.co.uk
