Setlist
Hank / Sit Down / Born Of Frustration / Heads / Many Faces / Out To Get You / Come Home / Coming Home (Pt 2) / Moving On / Getting Away With It (All Messed Up) / Sometimes / LaidSupport
n/a - FestivalMore Information & Reviews
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“Lightning flashes ominously in the background as James take to the stage as the sun begins to set and the full moon appears in the sky. That mix seems to fire the band up tonight for one of the strongest festival sets we’ve ever seen them perform. There’s a confidence running right through the band now that feels infectious as if there’s an unstoppable momentum propelling them forwards.”
Read the full review on EvenTheStars.co.uk
“James are festival veterans though and know that however much you experiment with the set, you need to leave the crowd with big hitters. Come Home sees [Tim] out amongst us, on the barrier and then crowd surfing, a particularly brave move here where there’s likely to be more wanting to capture an iPhone moment rather than holding him up.”
Read the full review at EvenTheStars.co.uk.
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“I had my reservations about tonight. They were well and truly dismissed about twenty seconds in however. This is James, doing what James do. A stunning team performance where they tested each other and they tested the audience throughout the entire two hour show. The musicianship is incredible. Saul Davies has a quiet night but oozes cool , Adrian Oxaal is truly stunned by the audience reaction at times and Andy continues to be intuitive, adding glittering touches to many of the songs.”
Read the full review on EvenTheStars.co.uk
“It’s time then to debut What’s It All About?, the closing track on Living In Extraordinary Times, and one of those journey songs that have so many different sections you can only identify them as coming from the same place by their dental records. It ends in a gentle acoustic strum with Tim repeating a mantra-like chorus, stood inches away from Adrian.”
Read the full review on EvenTheStars.co.uk
“James then crank it up for the romp through the final third act. Tim dives into the audience for How Was It For You? and is surfed aloft almost right round the King George’s Hall. Born Of Frustration provides more audience interaction as Andy pops up around the balcony like a manic trumpeting troubadour. And Attention is even better with the stronger drum beats that are the new band trademark.”
Read the full review on EvenTheStars.co.uk.
“Tim’s off into the crowd again for Born Of Frustration, but this time he scales the speaker stacks and climbs on to the balcony where he stops to dance with people as he makes his way round to be met by Andy who’s entered at the other side. There’s a moment where they stand face to face, vocal soaring with the trumpet call, and then they pass and complete their circle.”
Read the full review on EvenTheStars.co.uk.
“To say that it must be difficult for the band to choose a set list each night from their 250 tracks would be a huge understatement, but it’s a skill that they’ve perfected. Though impressed by all of the new tracks, the most memorable for the majority is likely to be ‘Many Faces’, which will soon sit alongside huge crowd pleasers ‘Sometimes’ and ‘Nothing But Love’.”
Read the full review on GIGsoupmusic.com
At the end of October 2017 James announced a special one-off intimate concert to benefit the We Love Manchester Emergency Fund with the following message “Very happy to announce this benefit gig that we have been trying to make happen since the atrocity took place. Please excuse our tardiness. We intend to make a memorable night of this intimate gig. With love, James.” The tickets for the 2,000 capacity Manchester Albert Hall sold out in minutes.
The gig itself was opened by an acoustic set by special guests The Slow Readers Club, who had supported them throughout the Girl At The End Of The World tour.
James then played a first set of new songs, acoustic arrangements and Q&A, including a 9-minuted improvisation to showcase how the band developed new material. The acoustic songs, arranged by Joe Duddell, featured a string quartet.
Glasvegas singer and songwriter James Allan played a solo keyboard and guitar set.
James returned for their main set. At the end James bid farewell to regular touring member Ron Yeadon.
Specific merchandise was produced for the gig, including a hoodie, t-shirt and Mancsy print, with all net-profits going to the We Love Manchester Emergency Fund.
Tonight James were soul music, healing the heart of a city that was devastated by an attack on the gig culture that is at the very core of what makes Manchester one of, if not the principal music city of the world.
They deliver it as ever with a cleverness that means momentum is never lost and Tim’s out amongst us on Curse Curse, bending almost contorted over the front rows as well as ignoring all health and safety rules and a fair bit of self-preservation by clambering up onto the balcony and dangling precariously over us for the main set closer Come Home, showing that their intent is not just to connect emotionally but also physically with us.
Read the full review at EvenTheStars.co.uk.
James were supported by Peter Hook And The Light. James’s Tim and Jim turned up on stage to play Love Will Tear Us Apart during Hooky’s set.
“With the release of remastered versions of Stutter and Strip-mine this week, it’s wholly appropriate that Johnny Yen gets played and it feels like welcoming back an old friend, but one that’s changed since you last met. It should have been a single way back in 1986 and it could have been a game changer, yet thirty one years on it feels as fresh as if it were a new song.”
This wasn’t the easiest gig James will ever play, working conditions weren’t in their favour, but they’re not a band to just lie back and take the easy route out. The setlist wasn’t full of crowd-pleasers, but anyone who knows this band, and even more those that understand them, should know that they’re never going to be dull performing monkeys like so many of the bands that are rightly deemed heritage bands have become. James are a living mutating beast, evolving constantly, reinventing themselves, turning themselves inside out and twisting themselves round and round.
Read the full review at EvenTheStars.co.uk
James are a band that all collaborate to deliver something truly special and this showed throughout the entirety of the gig, especially during ‘Attention’; their favourite track to play from ‘Girl at the End of the World’. Beginning with piano, ‘Attention’ is a slow starter until keyboardist Mark Hunter leads a euphoric breakdown, before the track proceeds in a truly exhilarating manner. ‘Sometimes’ was another euphoric moment, though in a different sense as the band stopped playing at the end of the song, allowing the crowd to continue the chorus at a volume that could surely have been heard for miles, before beginning to play again.
James produced a unique T-shirt for the Castlefield gig, with each sale providing a donation to the Manchester Emergency Fund.
This type of stage was made for James and tonight they deliver possibly the finest hometown show we’ve seen them deliver. There’s something for everyone in a set that spans the best part of three and a half decades from their Factory single Hymn From A Village, that still sounds as fresh and vital as it did when it came out through to a brand new song called Busted that is being played for only the second time and which makes us firmly believe that this is a band with years still left in their tank with their creative spark burning stronger than ever rather than dimming with age.
Read the full review at EvenTheStars.co.uk
…Nothing But Love has the crowds in raptures, many giving random strangers high fives and hugs, and up on the sloping grass upper-echelons of Castlefield Bowl the giddier kippers in their daisy t-shirts are near sliding up and down with joy.
Read the full review at ManchesterEveningNews.co.uk
It’s hard to explain the ragged attraction of a James show to people who are used to polished and over-rehearsed slick performances or acts that rely on backing tapes, but it’s that knife-edge of excitement of knowing that a song the band have played a million times could fall apart any second that keeps the diehards coming back. It’s called live music; you should try it sometime.
Read the full review at SoundsMagazine.co.uk
James well and truly came home and whilst Booth sang the lyrics “I’m in awe of you” during ‘Of Monsters & Heroes & Men’ earlier in the evening, the bands set left a sold out Castlefield Bowl full of fans well and truly in awe of James.
Read the full review at GigSoupMusic.com
Having attended a fair few James gigs over the years their ability to draw in a crowd as they perform is a joy to behold, I don’t think I have ever encountered a band who can layer up a song is such intricate layers that drag you some place new.
Read the full review at FlickOfTheFinger.co.uk