Music

Maximo Park in Oxford

Incongruous as it may seem, the intimate, history-drenched Oxford Union debating hall feels like a rather appropriate venue for quirky rockers, Maximo Park. Singer Paul Smith’s much-discussed new image – revolving mainly around the oversized bowler hat he now prefers to a hipster-nerd combover – has just the right hint of archaic Englishness to complement the fusty library smell, stained glass windows and marble busts of erstwhile Oxford luminaries that characterize this small chamber. Besides, any band that gets the word ‘dialectical’ into their second song of the evening are surely going to feel at home in such erudite company.

Clockwork Orange-like, Smith prowls the stage with a maniac’s glint in his eye, as the catchy staccato guitar riffs of the band’s first tune – ‘Girls Who Play Guitars’, from recently released second album ‘Our Earthly Pleasures’ – sets the tempo. Just a couple of minutes in and the microphone stand has already developed a weeble-like life of its own and keyboardist, Lukas Wooller is frenziedly pounding the keys with his floppy quiff energetically moshing in accompaniment.

In a recent interview Smith said that stage is where he feels the band really excel – and that he finds the idea of winning over a brand new audience every night hugely seductive. Well, it shows.

It is, so Smith tells the 200-or so of us gathered here tonight, the first (‘and possibly the last’) time ever that a band has performed in this unusual space – another TBA coup. They’re so close that it’s almost like having the band perform in your living room (though living in a place like this would be pretty weird).

The next track, another newie, sounds – if you can imagine such a thing – like Supertramp doing Morrissey covers: ‘Would you like to go on a date with me?/ I know it’s old fashioned to say so’ sings Smith, sounding as quintessentially English as his surroundings. Throughout, musical connoisseurs no doubt catch eclectic snatches of sounds from XTC to Ultravox, Pulp and the Smashing Pumpkins. (Smith, however, has admitted he’d rather conjure up images of Leonard Cohen and Iggy Pop.)

Maximo Park exclusive footage

Check out exclusive video from Maximo Park's Vodafone TBA gig in the Oxford University Debating Hall in Oxford.

View Maximo Park footage

The mood mellows with the melancholy chiming guitars of ‘Parisian Skies’ (‘a song about breaking up with someone’, says Smith). The empty-eyed marble busts in the room gaze impenetrably into the distance – it adds a rather lovely poignancy to the song. Wonder what they’d make of this if they were flesh and blood rather than stone?

Bouncy former single, ‘Our Velocity’, perks things up again with its retro sci-fi keyboards, echoed by heavy, frantic guitars – somehow, in its live translation it morphs into a bizarrely brilliant hybrid of Austin Powers and The Ordinary Boys. Something that really shouldn’t sound as good as it does.

"Absolutely amazing. I’d heard they were good live but this surpassed all my expectations."
Melissa, London

"They’re a fantastic band, and we were closer to them than we’ve ever been. Being able to see them from the back of the stage and see what they put into the performance was just brilliant."
Steve, London

"Paul. He’s gorgeous, stunning. And the sweat coming off him is so manly. A real man!""
Daisy, Glasgow

Each song gets a little aside: ‘This song’s about someone who changed the way I think’ (‘Apply Some Pressure’); ‘This song’s about whether it’s right to follow your urges or not’ (‘Your Urge’); ‘Everyone thinks this song’s about books, but it’s not’ (‘Russian Literature’); and, rather endearingly, as a prelude to very up-tempo ‘The Unshockable’, Smith reveals that: ‘This is another of the difficult second album songs… sometimes they’re difficult to play…,’ before concluding, ‘oh – come on, let’s just play it!’ (The band even manages to slip out of synch briefly, as if to prove his point).

This warm, intimate vibe, along with a general air of excitable gusto gives Maximo Park’s live performance a marvellous genuineness – yes, there’s bucket-loads of stage charisma (the infamous scissor jump makes several appearances – and, by old favourite, ‘Limassol’, from Mercury-nominated album number one, Smith is straddling a monitor, surveying the crowd Jesus-like while guitarist, Duncan Lloyd, waves his instrument in the air), but rather than feeling like empty rockstar posturing and going through the motions, you get the sense that Maximo Park really just enjoy what they’re doing. Long may they do so!