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When this hack last witnessed a Razorlight live show, Johnny Borrell spent more time posing and thrusting his pre-pubescent chest at the crowd than singing. Tuesday night at Nottingham Arena was completely different; he kept his shirt on until the encore. There wasn’t much posing or audience interaction but the boys had stepped up their game to give a polished and exciting performance that electrified the arena. Once the stage shroud dropped, Andy Burrows opened the show with a ferocious drum solo leading into ‘In the Morning’ and the gig just got better with ‘Hold On’ followed by ‘Golden Touch’ and ‘Back to the Start’.
Johnny was somehow untouchable in a white outfit that looked like it had not only won the Daz doorstep challenge, but had also been bought for a teenage girl but it didn’t matter as he strutted round the stage belting out ‘Vice’ and ‘Los Angeles Waltz’.
There will always be those snobbish fans who think they ‘own’ a band just because they first saw them play before they had a record contract who will probably hate the second album fans who only knew the words to ‘America’ but it did get one of the biggest sing-alongs of the night. In what looked like the glow from a toxic waste spill the whole arena had an eerie radiance about it as a thousand mobile phones were held up throughout the number one single.
Thankfully there were no obvious signs of any tension between Andy and Johnny following their bust up earlier this month. Second album songs, ‘Who Needs Love?’, ‘Before I Fall to Pieces’ and the lovely ‘Kirby’s House’ sounded great before the rousing first album track ‘Don’t go Back to Dalston’. The main set ended with ‘I Can’t Stop This Feeling I’ve Got’, ‘Pop Song 2006’ and ‘In the City’.
For the encore Johnny came back on his own and a gorgeous solo of ‘Fall, Fall, Fall/Milk’ followed by full band backing for the crowd pleasing ‘Rip it Up’ ending with a knicker wetting version of ‘Stumble and Fall’. The people who didn’t prematurely scurry off after the first encore were treating to a fantastic rendition of ‘Somewhere Else’. The band gave an amazing performance and Nottingham was full of Razor-love for many hours afterwards.
