"Here's a song we wrote in 2007," says a humbled Yannis Philippakis - overcome at the mass of flailing limbs after countless circle pits briefly subside. "We were living in Oxford and never thought we'd be introducing it at Wembley. It's called 'Balloons'."
Thinking back to how 'Balloons' stuck out like a sore thumb amid the white noise of so much trite nu-rave back in those days, tonight seems nothing short of miraculous. The cardigan-wearing math-rock introverts of way back when could never have foreseen what was coming.
You should always be the future you want to see. With their highly-hung guitars and various idiosyncrasies, Foals could have been little more than another quirk on the tapestry of 00s indie darlings. You remember; those sparks who shone so brightly, but were little more than a flicker. But when they returned with the mighty Total Life Forever, their flicker became a flame - one would that burn the rule book and light the long and unrelenting path to headlining Reading & Leeds. But first, another honour must be collected - prove that they're worthy of arenas, at arguably the most iconic of them all.
From the off, it's impossible to imagine them playing anywhere else.The paranoid rush of 'Snake Oil' immediately blooms into every corner of the room. They've finally reached a venue size to match their every skywards ambitions. 'Olympic Airways' can now be played on the scale that it deserves, and the undeniable bounce of 'My Number' is what Wembley was built for.
No arena show is complete without a staggering, rotating light show and visual display, but Foals do not lean on this as a crutch. Bells and whistles there may be, but this is not another rock n' roll circus or pantomime.
'Mountain At My Gates' is not only the centre-piece of What Went Down, but a mini-epic that defines the greatness they've finally achieved. Played in a room of such prestige, it's never been more clear - which makes the signposts that led them to it all the more delicious. The sprawling and aching grace of 'Spanish Saraha', flowing into the twitching experimentalism of 'Red Socks Pugie' before the sheer class of the elegaic (and arguably their greatest song) 'Late Night' and an utterly feral outing of 'Inhaler' shows that Foals are now a fully-evolved beast. A beast devouring arenas and all challenges that stand in their path.
They're more than worthy Reading headliners, they're utterly unstoppable.Expect history to be made.
Foals played:
Snake Oil
Olympic Airways
My Number
Birch Tree
Give It All
Mountain at My Gates
Balloons
Providence
Spanish Sahara
Red Socks Pugie
Late Night
A Knife In the Ocean
Inhaler
Encore:
London Thunder
What Went Down
Two Steps, Twice
Foals' remaining UK dates are belew. For tickets and more information, visit here.
Foals will play:
Fri February 19 2016 - BIRMINGHAM Barclaycard Arena
Sat February 20 2016 - LEEDS first direct Arena
