The Levellers - Proud Gallery, London

United Kingdom | by John Bownas | 22 July 2008

The Levellers returned to something close to their roots tonight as they performed a rare full band/small venue set in the occasionally pretentious but tonight sweaty and gritty setting of Camden's Proud Gallery.

Yeah to pear cider... boo to poor bar management and room temperature bottles. Yeah to hand stamps and an escape to the Lock Tavern for a cool pint with frontman Mark Chadwick... raised eyebrows to strawberry white Belgian lager that looks like snakebite and black and tastes like Robinson's Barley Water.

'Letters From the Underground' (the title of the album being launched tonight in aid of The Big Issue) marks the band's latest foray into penning new songs. And it has to be said that tunes such as 'Cholera Well', 'Burn America Burn' and 'A Life Less Ordinary' (all performed tonight to rapturous crowd response) seem to mark a return to form for a band whose staple diet over the past few years has consisted mainly of a score or so of anthemic songs from their youthful heyday... songs which still stand tall on tonight's setlist, as the crowd erupts for 'Beautiful Day', 'River Flow', and the encore of 'Liberty'.

'Letters' is an ambitious album that deserves a second, third and fourth listen before any firm conclusions can be drawn. With strong songs that aspire to inspire in the same way that the band's timeless classics from their first three long players managed so well, it is down to you to decide whether this is just a formula-driven release that will sit comfortably but not prominently in your iTunes playlists, or something more fundamental. At any rate, it's a genuine return to form in the studio from a band who have expended so much energy over the past decade furiously gigging across the world as if they were still trying to prove to someone what we already know: that they are one of the best live propositions on any stage you are ever likely to encounter.

The proof of this is in The Levellers' ability to condense and compress their normal big-stage show into a no less impressive and intimately warm small-stage experience here at Proud. As much a tight-knit family as a group of musicians, each of The Levellers manages as always to display something of their off-stage persona through their on-stage performance.

Mark may always be the band's ego, but he's confident enough in his ability to regularly allow others to take the limelight. Simon takes centre stage without fuss or fanfare and pulls impish faces at Matt when he thinks nobody else is looking. Jon exherts a gravitational influence on the rest of the team whilst concentrating on the important business of that fiddle. Charlie lives in a world of his own behind those drums, but grounds the others like a lightning conductor. Matt may have been a permanent fixture on the line-up for a good few years now, but he still seems to enjoy every show as if it was his first. And Jeremy...well Jeremy is just Jeremy...a crusty anachronism who coyly challenges you to say a single bad word against anything, in the true spirit of Neil from the Young Ones...

'Letters from the Underground' was born in Brighton (where the band are based), but has travelled to one of North London's hippest venues for its baptism. If it can mature and prosper even half as well as it's 18 year-old siblings have managed then it will grow up to be a respected member of the musical community. Only you can judge it's potential, so check it out when you can and we'll see you back down the front at the next show.

www.myspace.com/levellers