The Wedding Present, 26 October 2007, Manchester Academy

The Wedding Present, 26 October 2007, Manchester AcademyI’m not going to attempt a well written review of a gig here, I’ve got too much bias with a band that I’ve loved to follow, (pretty fervently for c. 21 years) to do a good, balanced review, but it’s nice to capture my thoughts on last night’s performance whilst fresh in my head.

TWP have never shied from gimmickry (12 singles in a year, for example, back in the 90s), and somehow they decided to take to the road to mark the 20th anniversary of their defining album, “George Best”. Great idea really; whole album, start to finish, in the right order. Like a dream gig in many ways for me.

To add to it all, the ten or so songs that they chose to sandwich George Best with were a well picked balance from the massive repertoire. ‘Blonde’ to come on to stage one-by-one, for example and a very well chosen ‘Kennedy’ to pick things up immediately after the George Best tracks.

Most surreal point of the evening was without doubt the full fluffy bunny costumed helper who came on stage with five big white number cards to count down the audience into the epic first four words of ‘Everyone Thinks He Looks Daft” (play below)

I took a few snaps on my phone but they were so poor so I had a play in photoshop – the lovely thing about gigs is the colour lights….

The Wedding Present, 26 October 2007, Manchester Academy The Wedding Present, 26 October 2007, Manchester Academy