We Were Promised Jetpacks, London Lexington

We Were Promised JetpacksJune 18, 2009

We Were Promised Jetpacks induce that honest excitement rarely seen in a climate so full of pretenders wanting to break the mould and start a revolution. Signed to FatCat not so long ago, this writer’s more-than-prediliction for Frightened Rabbit meant that she fell for them almost immediately back in February after seeing them at The Borderline. Their combination of frantic energy, sensitive observational lyrics and frenzied playing makes for something to get excited about, for sure.

These Four Walls is such a sonically varied album, with the riproar of ‘Quiet Little Voices’ set so starkly against ‘A Half Built House’. As laudible as all of that it, it’s travesty the latter is omitted tonight, failing to convey the diversity and strength in We Were Promised Jetpacks’ repertoire. Live, the album’s lead tracks are sped up to maximum desperation; this is most evident on the squeezed-through-a-wrench squeal of “forming an orderly queue/outside your house”, on ‘Roll Up Your Sleeves’. The band are fairly loose, and it works best that way. The unfortunate thing about this is that the claustrophobia becomes the overriding theme, where the album breaks it up with moments of space and clarity. Optimistically this will be built on with time, but for now the alternate all-out powerhouse persona does the trick aptly.

Ever modest, ‘Quiet Little Voices’ is introduced by Thompson as “our only good song” – it’s odd to see a band so bashfully unaware of just how well they nail the anthems. The drumming is phenomenal, pushing the emotions further forward into the crowd. That said, Jetpacks’ frontman is more confident now than when we’ve seen him before, introducing each song and indulging in a spot of mild word-volleying here and there as if to prove his band’s worth.

Colossal guitar breaks are the order of the day, never more anticipated than on set opener ‘Keeping Warm’. Despite some initial tuning problems, we’re unable to imagine anything else introducing the four-piece to the stage; the track’s eight minutes are all crucial, absolutely captivating, and the xylophone twinkles are a delight too. An instrumental for the first four minutes, it’s a perfect introduction.

‘Moving Clocks Run Slow’ is more direct on stage, ‘It’s Thunder and It’s Lightning’ with added drama. Without an encore, the outgoing feeling is that this eight-song set has passed too quickly. If We Were Promised Jetpacks continue to grow at this rate (and introduce their more experimental material into their setlists), they’ll something brilliant to offer rather than simply exciting.

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