Anyway, with the benefit of hindsight and waiting for other reviews (which seem lacking ) I can assure you that this concerts was a blast. The Sage wasn't packed to the rafters, nor was the "mosh pit" overcrowded -- just as well as it allowed me to swing my fetching orange State T shirt around like a demented dervish during World Wide Epiphany. However, lack of bodies was more than compensated by energy and good vibes from band and audience in a sort of intimate symbiotic relationship that had this particular near 55 year old actually putting his "hands in the air " during Party Liquor , as if I was a recently liberated 18 year old in Ibiza , for the first time. All this after I resolutely thought I'd not follow instructions of any sort for doing the aforementioned movement , or clapping along. How wrong I was -- to paraphrase Kiki Dee;- I / we had the music in me/us and away we went for 90 minutes of arthritic and ungraceful but heartfelt terpsichorean expression.
There were some glitches;- Foamy got temperamental and Todd flicked the "V"s toward it ( for American readers -- that's "flipping the bird(?)); Todd cocked up the words to Collide o Scope resulting in on stage merriment and there was a momentary loss of everything , before it all kicked back in which Todd dealt with expertly by confronting this with a sort of Gallic shrug.
You know the set list by now; you know the treatment of old favourites; you know its Todd guitar lite (but Jesses mangling and effects were great ), you know Prairie keeps the beat , and you know some people in Manchester seem not to know how to have a good time(see their reviews)
I believe the exhortation is "Free your mind and your ass will follow" Give it a try -- see what State of mind you achieve
